In the Eye of the Beholder
by Rusty And The Rubix Horse
Summary: Post Silent Hill movie, with the miraculous return of Cybil. The devil isn't finished with the two women yet, but through it all, an unlikely romance unveils itself. Spoilers, and FF content. Nothing graphic, I don't think...please Read and Review!
1. Evasive Maneuvers

**A/N:** Okay, so this is my first Silent Hill fiction. There's definitely not enough of them out there that I like to read, so I thought maybe I'd write one of my own, for those of you like moi. I've never played the games, only seen the movie—and now I know that I'm not the only one who thought there was something…odd…about Rose and Cybil's relationship—so everything will be based off of stuff I gathered from the movie, and whatever I can find on Google. Oh yeah, and if F/F pairings ruffle your feathers…don't read it. It could contain some spoilers—I'm not sure just yet. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer:** Plot is mine, relevance to the game and movie is not.

* * *

**Chapter One**

The silence wasn't anything she hadn't become used to over the past few days. In fact, it had been one of the few—the _very_ few—things she had actually liked about that horrific place. Back at home, in the dead of society, the sound of the cars passing on the highway and the television blaring in the living room had long since succeeded in driving Rose Da Silva half to insanity. Of course, now that she was back from _that_ place, insanity didn't seem such a far off concept. Anyone she talked to would have narrowed their eyes and whispered amongst themselves, spreading rumors that she wasn't right in the head, and that the stress of parenting _that_ girl had finally gotten to her.

Maybe it had.

It wasn't any secret that Sharon wasn't the…_easiest_…child to care for. With her sleepwalking, and nightmares, and constant cries for the place she had undeniably been conceived and birthed in. Even after the ordeal there, and the transcendence into a world of less than cheerful knowledge, the girl still had her fits, and her mother was still forced to sleep with her back against the girl's bedroom door, with only the comfort that the window was locked and barred present to soothe her aching mind. As one might expect, however, neither Rose or her daughter slept peacefully these days. The misty silence of that forgotten and Hell-spawn town had filled the rooms of the Da Silva household, and prevented the mother and child from reaching the world they had known for all their lives.

Rose still hadn't quite worked out the details of their predicament. They were home, yes, and the town was far behind them—but still, they were not _home_. Chris was nowhere to be found, and more than once the broken woman's more intelligent half demanded that she return to that cruel place and remain there; that she would never see her husband again; that the deathly silence she had once been so soothed and comforted by had at last become a screaming siren, unendingly unbearable in its volume; that she had not yet experienced the hell that was Silent Hill.

Dreams had plagued her since those nights there, and for the moment at least, they showed no signs of ceasing. They consisted of images, mostly, sound was not present it seemed, but the images blared millions of words. Those creatures she had met in the subway—those tiny, grey, reaching arms and the wailing of inhuman children, and the manner in which they had swarmed her body, overtaken her, and very nearly killed her. The sirens of the church steeple rang in her ears—the only sound ever heard in such dreams. The sirens that were both her savior and her punisher; a warning and a chance to escape should she be near the church; a curse upon knowing they were too far away to reach. Yet the image that haunted her most of all—that one collaboration of color and shapes created via signals from the confused brain—was the memory of that charred and smoldering mass which hung upon a ladder nearly twenty feet above her head.

Cybil Bennett.

Her only friend in her time of utmost need; her only sanctuary when all hope seemed to have been lost; her savior and her captor; her protector and her foe. All these opposites in the exact same moment. Driven to follow the broken woman and child by way of suspicion, and compelled to keep Rose alive throughout a journey likely thought pointless, the young officer had more of a connection with the woman who lay on the hardwood floor now than either of them would have liked. And though Rose had seen the scorched remains of what had once been that lively young woman whose duty by oath was to protect and serve, there lingered in the back of her mind a thought that she could not _truly_ be gone. No. The horror wasn't over yet. With the resourceful Silent Hill on her side—or against, depending on how one might examine the matter—Cybil Bennett could never die.

Clapping her hands over her ears upon waking from another violent dream of sirens and nurses, the exhausted Rose shook her head from side to side, willing the pain and guilt away, and the memory that seemed perfectly comfortable retaining its place on the interior of her eyelids, so that whenever she might try to shut out the fear, it would be replaced by sheer terror. The blood pounded and throbbed in her head, and she felt her skull would burst and spew the memories forth, and they would become real once more, and she shook her head even harder, sobbing into her knees and trembling so severely, she feared she was having a seizure. How the thought of one particular individual's death could so destroy her as had Cybil Bennett's, Rose was unable to comprehend, and though she wished not to will away the memory of her protector entirely, 'twas times like these during which she longed for the ability to simply fall into death, and know no more.


	2. Silence and Solitude

**Chapter Two**

Oh, how she so truly and deeply wished for the freedom she had once possessed before her time in Silent Hill. Even with her daughter's constant need for attention, there had been time for _her_ and no one else. Now though, it seemed that the visit to that horrid place had worsened Sharon's fits, and drowned her even deeper in the world of dream-filled sleep, during which she would rise and physically fight her mother as she attempted to leave the misty house. All whilst she was asleep. Never waking until the morning sunlight weaved its way through the thick laden fog and into her dirty window, so that it might touch a single ray upon her face and rectify the wrong that had been done to her in the past darkness, only to have it come upon her again, a continuous cycle of goodness and evil clashing for all eternity, never for one to win or lose, but rather be matched in equal superiority. Rose was frightened more than ever for her daughter's health, and had at times considered placing her in another's care. Perhaps a hospital or institution, where she might finally have some peace, and her mother the same. Yet the fog that choked the house wasn't present only within it. It entirely enveloped the structure from the outside in, and the forest and roads and cities were also cloaked and hidden by that very same mist. The mist composed of soot and ash, blanketing all the hurting family had ever known, and denying them sanctuary.

It had become obvious to the young mother that life wasn't ever going to be _normal_ again; her husband and all other traces of human kind had vanished; 'twas as if the town that was Silent Hill had followed her home, and invaded, infected, and contaminated the peace she had been hoping to receive upon she and her daughter's return. Yes, this truly was the curse of Silent Hill. Rose and Sharon were blindly and utterly alone, as if living in another realm of the world they had once known, where life existed and thrived but was entirely unreachable. She felt as if she could taste it and smell it and feel it and hear it, but sight was limited, and she was steadily losing more, leaving her unable to find her way _home_. Perhaps if Cybil had been alive she would have returned to the town of Brahams, if only to discover she was still alone, save for the manifestation of the devil and his opposite that was Sharon Da Silva. Alas, the officer was no longer amongst the living, and Rose would never return to a town so near to the place that had filled her with far more than just grief.

Unless of course she finally realized she had no other choice but to return.

Sharon's fits had continued to worsen, and quite obviously they weren't intending to decrease in intensity any time soon. Rose would inevitably be forced back to the ash-caked Silent Hill, whether she liked it or not. Love and concern for her daughter—who wasn't even of her own blood—would compel her. The strength of the family bond was immense; love like an invisible tissue unable to be fully severed from the ones it connected; Rose couldn't possibly compete with the natural need and maternal instincts that demanded she aide and protect her daughter—even if she was adopted. There wasn't anything in the world—be it the one she was currently residing in, or the one she had known all of her previous life—that could cause her to relinquish that crushing grip on the hope that her daughter might one day be at peace, and able to live as Rose had intended her to; to grow into a beautiful and successful young woman who was content with herself and her life, and who would age gracefully, and one day die beside those who cared for her. Not trapped in the hellhole that was Silent Hill.

As the first rays of dawn filtered through the air, heavy with worry and silence, Rose gathered her legs beneath her and stood, rounding and laying a wary hand upon the glinting golden doorknob, turning it and opening the door just so, and allowing herself a quick glimpse of Sharon, who lay in her bed, the comforter thrown off to one side, the remaining sheets twisted angrily about her small form like a cocoon—a sign of another night's lack of peaceful sleep. The mother's eyes softened at the sweet innocence that seemed to envelope the girl in her resting, but she knew it would be short lived. For soon the girl would wake to find she was still locked in this everlasting nightmare, her window still barred shut, the slightly bloodied scratches upon the glass courtesy of nails upon desperate fingers, having attempted to claw her way through the pane. And she would remember none of the evening past. And she would cry and plead to her mother that the nightmare be stopped. And her mother would close the door and collapse to the mahogany paneled floor so as to plead the same, and cry with the knowledge that she could do nothing to ease either of their suffering.

Or perhaps this was not the case.

In the very depths of that war-torn, battle-scarred heart, Rose Da Silva understood what she needed to do. Nothing good would ever become of the mother and daughter were she not to seek in Silent Hill the answer she had been longing to find since first learning of her child's past. Alessa's attempt at an explanation may have sufficed for Rose and Sharon's time in that misbegotten community of sinners, but it did nothing in the way of deciphering the causes of what they were now experiencing—this kind of non-violent Hell, whose method of torture consisted only of silence, confusion, and solitude. After all, from what Rose had gathered from Alessa's tale, the mother and daughter were the only purities present in that awful place. What had they done to deserve fates such as that which they had apparently received? Rose herself had aided in the devil's entry into the sacred grounds of the church, allowing for her vengeance and the destruction of the woman Christabella, among others. She had done all that was asked of her, in the hope that perhaps one day she and her child might return to the life they had been meant to live. But still they lay tortured in their own loneliness and lack of understanding.

Closing the door just as quickly as she had opened it, the barely audible squeak that emanated from the twisting of the knob seemed to split the atmosphere at its seams, and Rose immediately dropped to her knees and covered her ears in physical pain. Having become unaccustomed to the sounds of society and life in general, the slightest vibrations of the bones in her ears were like the sound of two foghorns held not an inch away from them. Something needed to be done which would end this, and she briefly considered the availability of the pistol that lay only a few feet beyond her immediate reach.

Cybil's gun.

She didn't even recall how it had come to be at her disposal. Had she taken it before or after the young cop's death? And why didn't she remember doing so? Or had she simply happened upon it, and retrieved it by sheer instinct alone? It was empty—so it wouldn't have proved much use to her, either in Silent Hill, or now as she kneeled before the door, hands still glued over her ears and head bowed into her chest, hot tears trailing down her face, and stubbornly refusing to release themselves to the hard floor, thus clinging to her and likely to be frozen by the inherent frigidity of her current emotional state.

No.

Suicide was not an option here, though not only because of the absence of bullets in the gun. Instead Rose had come to grasp the fact that taking her own life would only ensure the fading of her daughter's. No, not even the overwhelming desire to put an end to this agony could so surpass her motherly instincts. They were a part of her she sometimes wished were not present, unable to be overcome. Whoever said sentiments were both a blessing and a curse hadn't been lying. A blessing in the sense that they could be truly lovely when seen in the right light; a harrowing curse when viewed in the wrong.

At last the woman removed her ghostly white palms from her ears, trembling the whole way back to her sides, until they were placed firmly against the smooth wooden surface beneath her, and pushed her to a standing position once again. She sensed activity in Sharon's room, but feared opening the door, lest she be taken down by the pain of sound a second time. Instead she leaned her head gently against the door and spoke in so quiet a voice, it could scarcely be named as such.

"Mommy's leaving for a bit, honey."

The panicked truth suddenly hit them both, and Rose broke down yet again, though whilst remaining standing and holding her position; Sharon scuttled across the floor of her misty room so as to take on a position so strikingly similar to that of her mother's, it could have been said they were indeed of shared blood. Her small ear, covered partially by stray locks of ebony silk, pressed against the door she knew her mother stood behind, though she was for the moment imperceptible.

"When is Daddy coming home Mommy?"

Composing herself, the woman stroked the door absentmindedly, as if it were the child herself, reaching down with the other hand to soundlessly rotate the lock upon the knob. Blue eyes strayed to the pistol a second time, and then to the form of the front door, and the silver SUV parked before it. Her lips quivered and she bit down on them for a moment's time, uncertain what to say next, eventually settling on an answer so vague, she knew it would offer no comfort to the girl. There was nothing else to say.

"Soon darling. Very soon."


	3. Tea Anyone?

**Chapter Three**

The rain frolicked upon the windshield of the SUV, frisking and dashing about, attempting to avoid the dangerous energy the determined wipers could apply to send it flying elsewhere, away from its most beloved playground. Rose's eyes were set stiffly on the winding strip of black continuously appearing at length before her, the faded yellow strips placed slightly off-center, the white sidelines minute and slight, nearly undetectable. Her hands gripped tightly the ten and two-o'clock positions on the wheel, not exactly the most proper position, nor the safest, but nonetheless a working one. The faint hum of the rubber tires doing their best to grip the slick pavement dropped the woman into a sort of trance, one in which she was aware of what was immediately going on around her, but not so much what was beyond those goings-on. Her attention shifted however, when she passed an all-too-familiar road sign: _Brahams—1 mile._

The realization that she had actually found her way back to the one place she had made a personal vow never to return to snapped the woman out of her glaze, and she slammed on the brakes for no reason in particular. Or perhaps there had been a reason. Had a being just crossed her path, or was it only her mind playing another cruel trick on her? Perhaps it was her nearness to Silent Hill breaking through the thin layer of her sanity. Or maybe it had already broken through. It wouldn't have been a surprise—anyone's presence here was enough to drive them to question reality. She lay her forehead against the wheel, hands refusing to relinquish their hold upon that same leather circle, and allowed several additional groups of salty tears to find home at the base of her chin, only to tremble to the point of letting loose and splashing down upon her faded blue jeans. Once composing herself, she raised her head and peered into the rearview mirror, noting the deep semicircles beneath her red and swollen lower lids, and how they had darkened considerably since her last critical look into a mirror.

Her hair was clean, though dull in color from days of remaining inside her suburban home, surrounded by damp atmosphere, and possessed by worry. Her skin seemed to have suffered the same fate; although 'twas relatively young and smooth, its hue was that of pale, sickly old woman, who perhaps lay dying in an uncomfortable hospital bed, in a dreary hospital room void of flowers and lacking visitors. She ran a finger over a gradually fading scar which traveled in a downward direction beside her left eye, wincing at the light flash of pain that accompanied the gesture. She didn't recall just what had left said mark upon her once lovely complexion, and to be truthful, she would have rather kept it that way. After all, most of the memories of the hellish Silent Hill that would be forever etched within the confines of her mind were less than pleasant.

A sudden burst of movement caught out of the corner of her eye resulted in the woman's sudden upward snapping of the head, and the rapid motion of whipping it around to cast her gaze in the direction of that movement, only to see empty fog and ash. Her ribcage expanded and contracted in quick, nervous breaths as she moved her hand to lock the doors of the truck—a probably futile attempt at securing her safety—but an attempt nevertheless. The light thud of the locks shifting into place caused the woman to flinch and jerk the hand toward her ear in a sort of unwelcome reflex, but she managed to stop the movement before it had been fully carried out. Her first thoughts deemed the sudden activity seen outside the vehicle to be a member of the satanistic town, a foe, a danger and something to be feared. However, another area of her mind suggested—or hoped, one of the two—that it was actually another human being, and someone who quite possibly could help her. But was it merely wishful thinking?

All at once, the passenger side window of the SUV exploded into thousands of tiny, piercing shards of supposed safety glass, causing Rose to throw her arms out before her, shielding her already suffering face from further damage, and falling into the door, and unlocking the doors by pure coincidence. Panicked and mindless at the present moment, though knowledgeable of the unlocked doors, quivering hands fumbled for the latch, and by instinct alone scrambled out of the vehicle. Her body hit the hard ground with a dull thud, knocking the wind out of her momentarily, but not so long as to prevent her from attempting escape. In truth, it probably hadn't been the most intelligent idea to leave the truck—the steel would have provided far more protection than open, mobile air. 'Twas then she came to realize that a thin trail of blood was coiling its way down from her wrist, wrapping around her forearm and finally coming to rest and drip from the point of her elbow. She was injured already—that couldn't possibly be a good sign.

Grasping her wrist with her uninjured hand in an effort to slow the bleeding, the woman rolled onto her stomach and then struggled to her feet, slouching as she fled the short distance to crouch behind the tire of the truck, holding her wrist up to her chest and struggling to catch her breath. Her every sense was on high alert, combing the area by all possible means and prepared to react to even the slightest hint of approaching…creatures. The sound of nearly silent footsteps reached her ears, following a pattern of steps similar to those of the drag-footed demons that walked the nearby town. But what were the chances that the creatures had left their domain to roam elsewhere? Would they? Or perhaps more importantly—_could_ they? Rose listened anxiously as the footsteps neared, and she edged sideways as quietly as humanly possible, around the rear bumper of the truck. All too late she realized that she had been spotted, and another shot was fired her way, only to be followed by a short and constricted gasp of disbelief. An instant later, knee-high boots and leather pants filled Rose's ground-fastened gaze.

"What the hell kind of sick death wish do you have Rose? This place is swarming with varmint, and you're out here joyriding?"

The young woman's eyes ricocheted off the ash-cloaked earth to connect with those of the dumbfounded cop, blue to blue, and each equally painted in outright astonishment. Swallowing some small amount of shock, Rose managed to let out a tiny squeak—a poor excuse for a reply—but it would have to do.

"I'd hardly call it a joyride, Cybil."


	4. Damnation Begone

**Chapter Four**

The absolute shock had yet to wear off of both women, as Rose remained in her position crouched behind the bumper, Cybil standing close by, for the most part keeping her eyes fixated on the form of the other woman, while occasionally darting them about so as to keep on a constant state of alert; it would seem that Silent Hill had gradually been making its way to the residences of the two friends, but had, naturally, reached Brahams first. There was no doubt in Rose's mind that the 'varmint' Cybil had spoken of were the demons the two had met during past travels; those disgusting, horrifying, half-roasted bodies, meandering about on twisted limbs and displaying other sickening deformities; those creatures she wished never to encounter again. Alas, here she was in Brahams, only a short distance from the devil's hideaway, sitting and cradling a limb already half mangled by way of mistaken identity on the part of her dead best friend, who wasn't so dead after all and was instead standing with a rifle poised to shoot anything that moved and might spit acid at her. 'Twas surreal--in the most preposterous, twisted sense of the word.

Cybil's cast her gaze down upon Rose, her every nerve of every cell flat out refusing to obey her brain's signals which told of the fact that she was no longer alone in the misty hell; that Rose had somehow managed to survive the wrath of the lunatics gallivanting around that town; that she had returned safe and sound—and daughterless. Upon realizing such a distinctly important piece of information to be true, the young cop's mind leapt to far off conclusions. Sharon hadn't made it. Somehow her mother had failed to retrieve her; somehow she had met a fate of similar type to the one Cybil herself had very nearly been faced with; somehow she had perished in that sweltering pit-like inferno, and Rose had returned in an attempt to cope. Her eyes swept across the pale face of the woman close by, taking in every speck of dust, every faintly visible line of aging, every thin scar which marred its genuine loveliness, in addition to the one of a more recent history, the wheels of her intelligent mind turning and grinding as they analyzed the emotion each blemish did its best to withhold. 'Twas then at which she laid eye to the injury so nearly concealed beneath the cloak of Rose's opposite palm, an injury detectable only by the barely viewable flecks of crimson scattered upon her blouse.

"My god—Rose—let me see that."

Fiercely hands of chilling temperature tore the unscathed palm from its place covering the wound, giving Rose little time to react and once having felt the sharp pain which accompanied the sudden motion, flinched violently and let out a short yelp. The cop pulled her wrist out to an extended position where she could examine the injury, the leather of her pants creaking in protest to her crouched position beside her friend, and every so often her eyes flickered elsewhere, likely still on the lookout for foes. It took a longer time than Rose would have liked for the other woman to determine the cause of the injury to be a bullet from the rifle which now lay against the battered rear bumper of the SUV. Quite obviously she had connected the dots though, for an instant later she uttered a particularly vulgar word and grabbed Rose by the upper arm, pulling her swiftly to her feet.

"C'mon. Inside."

Once again, there was little time for Rose to react, let alone protest, though she did manage to lay hold on the rifle as Cybil practically dragged her toward an abandoned building she hadn't even realized had been present until that particular moment. The butt of the rifle trailed a wavy depression in the ashen soil, for Rose was unable to lift it any higher due to its ridiculous length, in addition to the fact that she was nearly tripping as it were—she didn't need the extra worry of keeping it off the ground. At long last Cybil released her to push open an outrageously weighty wooden door, heavily laden with tainted brass décor; Rose seized the opportunity to shift the position of the rifle to one of more comfort; Cybil moved aside and shoved her through the entranceway with a tad bit more force than had probably been necessary. In her previous time in Silent Hill, however, Rose had grown used to the cop's ungentle nature—in physicality at least; emotionally the mother was quite aware of her friend's softness and sensitivity.

Yes, the interior mind of the young officer was nothing of the steely outward appearance she had chosen to take on, even now that she was back with Rose in a similar situation as to the one they had fought their way through just a short time ago. In fact the woman was a rather over-emotional creature, one only who tended to deny that inherent piece of her being. Rose knew her for who she was, for the most part, but even in her presence Cybil was rendered incapable or unable to adhere to that fact, and allow herself to act as the human she knew she truly was.

As Cybil slid a thick board into place behind the door so that it might be prevented from opening, and braced a large shovel against it as well, Rose collapsed into a dusty chair situated just a bit too far from the nearby desk to provide her with the knowledge that it had not been moved from its place. The short scratches upon the dirtied flooring were cast about in all directions, though they ended beneath the clawed feet of the chair, indicative of some sort of struggle, perhaps. Slightly unnerved, the mother glanced about the room; empty slots lined the walls of two sides of the room; the desk by which she was seated was home to an ancient wheel-dial telephone and several withered and yellowing notepads; the last two walls were plastered with crooked portraits and rust-framed photos of horses carrying leather pouches filled to the brim with envelopes.

"How old is this town anyway?" Rose inquired, her voice calm but distant, as if she were distracted by the obvious history the building held. The pain in her wrist had long since subsided to a dull, throbbing ache, thus she was nearly unaware of the injury as if it had never existed at all—until Cybil turned 'round at her position by the door and let out a quick demand that Rose stay where she was, as she had been fixing to stand.

"This place wasn't part of the town," the cop voiced as she fished out a bandage from the utility belt wrapped 'round her waist. "It was one of the last stops on the Pony Express route. I'm not sure how the telephone got here."

She knelt down and took Rose's wrist once more, causing the mother to inhale sharply, flinch, and look down, instinctively attempting to pull it from the other's grip as she did so. The cop's grasp was firm, though, and Rose was ultimately unsuccessful; she relented to permitting a small amount of water to be poured onto the wound, flushing out infection to the best of its ability, and grimaced as the bedraggled bandage was wrapped repetitively about her wrist. Once finished, Cybil righted herself and walked over to a dirt-frosted window, cleared a viewing space with her sleeve, and gazed worriedly through it. Rose followed her with her eyes, but they were momentarily distracted when the shovel slid to the floorboards with such volume, both were certain the scraping of the metal was in fact the unwelcome sirens of the church at Silent Hill.

The officer reacted quickly enough; an instant in time past and the shovel lay wedged tightly beneath the oddly shaped handle of the door, likely unable to be moved from its place there; Rose watched with uninterested eyes as the object was put in said position, and after a brief moment's thought, chose to turn the subject in a more…necessary…direction. She fidgeted in her spot on the chair, Sharon's face coming to mind as her mind drifted backward in time to Silent Hill, and as she prepared herself to ask the question which would have rightly been on anyone's mind had they just discovered one they thought to be dead was anything but, and braced for the surreal response she would most likely receive.

"Cybil…" the mother began quietly, uncertain how exactly she should word the inquiry, for she wished for an answer that was as short and to-the-point as possible. No memories were desired to be stirred up if it could be avoided. The cop looked around at her, probably already knowledgeable as to just what the question was Rose intended to ask. "Would you mind explaining to me just how the hell you managed to get yourself out of that last…predicament?"

Hiding her face from view and nodding more to herself than to the speaker, Cybil gripped a rope which dangled aimlessly and uselessly from the rotting ceiling above with one hand, and rested the other on the empty holster which had once been home to her pistol. The woman wasn't keen to speak of the matter—this much was obvious by the far-off expression present in her features—and though she made no attempts at dancing around the matter, her reluctance did indeed result in a most unsatisfactory reply. Having composed herself, two steps were taken so as to round on the seated Rose, each placed with the dull thud so characteristic of her heeled leather biker boots, and the cop spoke.

"Let's just say it wasn't particularly _easy_ to get my hands on one of those half-dead monstrosities."

"A substitute?"

"Of sorts."

Silence ensued, the anxiety so thickly laden in the damp and foggy atmosphere that one might have dared venture to slice a section of that emotion free and remove it for other uses; neither woman happened to be ambitious enough—or courageous enough—to properly finish whatever excuse for a conversation they were currently disengaged in; Cybil unprepared to continue, and Rose frustrated and deeply unsatisfied. Alas, little could be done to ease the tenseness present there, for a vicious cycle had enveloped them both; one unwilling to voice further inquiries and the other as equally unwilling to either answer or accept the silence. This unnerving bit of quiet was shattered soon following, however, when Rose moved to a standing position and strode about until she was placed a comfortable distance away from her friend, holding in her hand a familiar possession. A blackened, soot-veiled, bullet-less pistol, which Cybil accepted with a faint smile.

The moment of calm evaporated upon immediate contact of the pistol and the ammunition which the cop had seemingly conjured up from nothingness, as a beastly crash came from the direction of the brazen door, no doubt some sort of entity seeking entry to their previously named safe haven.


	5. A Mother's Love

**A/N:** Reviews would be nice peoples—I feel like I'm writing for nothing

* * *

**Chapter Five**

The blatant attempted demolition of the heavy door was enough to send even the bravest of sensible humans into panic mode; Rose had reacted instinctively and shied away from the door, leaving Cybil positioned before her, as had become typical following the officer's predictable demands to "Stand back." The pistol, now loaded, had been stripped of its safety and found itself to be cocked and aimed at the doorway; the owner had taken on a stance of utmost alertness and tenseness, one arm outstretched in the classic manner of attempted protection of the woman behind her. The thudding from the door became rhythmic, and Rose's mind immediately jumped to the conclusion that the producer of the noise was one of the miners from the nearby town of Silent Hill. The sound was strikingly similar to the blundering of the metal rods they carried with them against the door of the locker room of the Midwich Elementary School, when she had been trapped there just that short time ago.

Yet just as suddenly as it had started, the sounds ceased, filling the room with another thick bout of silence, save for the haggard breathing of Cybil, who remained in place; her hands quaked noticeably, and despite the dim light filtering through the dirtied glass windows, Rose was able to lay eye upon the anxiety present in her friend's posture. She couldn't possibly have blamed her—anyone having been forced to return to such a place as Silent Hill, or the town nearest it would be bound to fear the whole of their curséd surroundings. A minimum of five minutes past, the young cop lowered the pistol cautiously, her free hand now gripping it in addition to the one already having done so; a slight lean was taken to one side so that she might glance through the circle of clarity in the glass window beside her, thoroughly expecting some form of miscreation to make a flying leap for her face, lest it be exposed to view. The glass separating her from the world outside did little to ease her concern.

Meanwhile Rose stayed hitched in her current position, either untrusting or unwilling enough to take a risk and shift that position to another; her eyes snapped from Cybil to the door and remained trained unblinkingly on that particular spot for a length of time that was presumptively unhealthy as far as the human need to keep moist the eyes was concerned. Eventually Cybil pivoted on the thick, tall black heel of her boot, her attention now upon Rose; one chilled palm gripped the mother's shoulder and shook her with quite a great amount of force as she voiced spoken word, resulting in Rose's abrupt returning to reality—or so it seemed. Blue eyes widened considerably, though briefly, apparently surprised that Cybil was even present in the room, let alone there shaking her back to some semblance of life; an instant past and they were narrowed into an expression of question and inquiry, as something along the lines of a request for the cop to repeat what she had said spilled forth from the fear-dried throat of Rose.

"Does your truck still run?"

Admittedly befuddled by the relevance the question had to anything the two were currently dealing with, or the situation they had found themselves locked within for the second allotment in a slim amount of time, the mother's head tilted just so to one side, so as to display her obvious confusion and curiosity. The muscle in her chest let out the last of its lusty poundings as she managed to calm herself to the point at which rational thought was capable; the keen mind was steadily cleansed of its adrenaline exorbitance; long at last the situation began to process, as did the inquest of the other woman present in the room; long at last words took shape, melting themselves into sentences, which synthesized into communicable sound.

"As long as that bullet didn't hit anything major."

"Excuse me?"

"You shot out my window."

"I wasn't exactly in the right of mind, you know."

"We need to get to Silent Hill."

Knowing better than to press the matter, and fully understanding that Rose's determination, once set in place, was set in stone, and was not easily removed, the cop ran a hand through her short flaxen hair; the spinning motion of her form that followed was something Rose had taken for habit—she tended to do so when nerves had gotten the better of her. Predictably, the officer was soon to be found facing the young mother yet again, her eyes narrowed and her eyebrows tilted, her expression withholding a sense of disbelief at her friend's recklessness, the seemingly incessant need for her to get herself into trouble in which her life would be endangered, and the absolute lack of the basic and natural instinct to self-preserve. As far as Cybil could see, Rose Da Silva was much more trouble than she was worth, and she would have been better off to simply leave the mother to her searching; but if there was one part of Cybil herself that was as equally flawed, 'twould be her instinct to protect and serve—she couldn't just abandon Rose. No. Something kept her there, always chasing after her when she took off on another one of her mindless pursuits of some runaway child; something kept her always saving her from certain death at the last minute—and at her own expense. The question evident in her eyes, Rose answered before Cybil even had a chance to ask.

"I need to help Sharon. And as far as I can tell, Silent Hill is the only place where I might stand a chance in Hell of finding out how exactly I'm supposed to do that. If you don't want to help, I'll understand."

Glancing at her slowly, the cop responded, clicking the safety of the pistol on and sliding it into the holster as she did so.

"It would have been nice if you'd told me that you'd found her first," she said in a quiet voice, her hands on her hips as she looked at the ground. "Where is she?"

"She's at home. I couldn't bring her back here again. Not after what she saw."

"A mother's love is undying."

"And so is a wife's love for her husband. It'd be nice to be able to see Chris again."

For a moment a look of surprise was brought about on the officer's face, but it was quickly replaced by one of understanding. Rose was a married woman, no doubt her only concern being for the safety and continuity of her family; Cybil had decidedly envisioned her as a single mother searching desperately for a way to ease both she and her daughter's suffering. Alas, this was not the case in its entirety. So deep in thought was the blonde haired deputy that she didn't even question Rose's sanity in leaving her child presumably alone whilst she returned to Silent Hill with an uncertain future in store. After a moment, however, the woman's head rose to glance at the door, and she picked up the rifle from its place by the chair where Rose had been sitting previously. No words were exchanged save for two, voiced by the cop as she readied the rifle, should she need to use it.

"Let's go."


	6. A Positively Warm Welcome

**A/N:** I'd like to thank Crimson Alessa for her review—very inspiring. I hope this chapter is up to par with the previous ones' standards. :)

* * *

**Chapter Six:**

The silhouette of the Jeep Liberty, although evident in sight, gave no indication of its presence as its silvery contours sifted through the thickly laden ash-fog of the bridge to Silent Hill. Rose recalled the day she had driven across the very same structure on her way out of the star-crossed town. Then, her thoughts had consisted only of her daughter and her husband; she'd been looking forward to seeing him again, and looking forward to reuniting her dearly beloved family. Now, she couldn't seem to fathom the idea that she was on her way into that nauseatingly vexatious venue—that settling whose sepulchral interior was ultimately dominated by fear and misery--for a second time, and of her own free will, besides. Her husband was not beside her, had not been beside her since the night they had discovered Sharon atop the monstrous waterfall. She was certain he was alive--however, reaching him was something she had yet to conjure up a plan for. No, the only one accompanying her that day was the blonde haired cop, her gusty heroine-like friend, turned friend only after having snagged Rose out of the clutches of otherwise undoubted fatality—and after the removal of a certain pair of loathed silver irons. It seemed that nearly having her figure mauled by a six-foot long blade pardoned the mother from whatever sort of kidnapping offenses she might otherwise have been faced with. Cops. They never had been known for their quick thinking and logical thinking abilities cooperating as one process.

Of course, seeing as Rose was anything but a child-abducting head case—all right, so she _was_ a head case…but not a crime-committing one—neither of those thought processes would have been necessary for the officer anyway. Not that heartless Cybil had known such fact at the time. Instead of attempting to arrest Rose for an _actual_ crime, she had cuffed her based purely on suspicion—and the fact that she had fled the scene, which certainly hadn't helped her case any.

Ah, but the musings of the emotionally afflicted Rose were cut short when an all-too-familiar sound filled the cabin of the vehicle. Creaking, boisterous, piercing and entirely unnerving static plunged through the large speakers of the Jeep, despite the radio's having been turned off, racking the women's ears and causing Rose to, yet again, flinch violently and cover her ears. Cybil's voice cried out over the static when she presumably realized that the driver's hands were no longer in place on the wheel; the truck swerved to one side of the bridge; Rose gasped and clamped her palms upon the worn leather in a last desperate attempt at regaining control, and caused the SUV to lurch sharply in the opposite direction. The sound of rubber on damp, ashen-slick road rocketed through the air, bursting through the tiny openings in the truck, and surrounding the two with frightening, pulsing volume.

An instant past and the grating of the metal frame could be heard as the vehicle careened beyond the point of control. The machine crashed onto its side...then its roof…then the opposite side…only to repeat a second and third time, finally coming to a crepitating halt with the passenger side upon the pavement; the ravaged mechanical exterior tilted so that it lay partially—nearly halfway, more so—off the edge of the bridge. Twisted steel and iron wrapped about the truck, the metal spurs of the destroyed guardrail reaching their way through the web-cracked windshield like angry, grappling fingers; though the miraculously uninjured Cybil was terrified for both her own safety and that of Rose's—fearful that the rails might have mangled the driver, seeing as they were protruding from that side of the truck in majority—she was also infinitely grateful, for they were the only reason the Jeep hadn't flown free into the bottomless abyss below.

Blinking to clear her vision, the officer cast a weak glance to further examine Rose's unconscious form; the once amiable face now rest thrown off at an odd angle, and a decent amount of blood sluiced from a rather large wound upon the forehead, spilling sticky scarlet drops upon the black leather seats and the dismantled dashboard. Concern overcame whatever pain she might have been feeling after the crash, and Cybil managed to free herself from the inward-dented door panel and the seat as well—the seat belt had snapped in several places, so it wasn't particularly difficult--making her way with an almost superhuman strength to throw her light weight against the other side of the truck. 'Twas a risk, she knew, but it was one she was willing to take. She stood no chance of freeing Rose from the mess of the Liberty with it on its side.

Very nearly exhausting herself as she did so, Cybil was relieved when the truck at last wobbled and ground against the protesting guardrails, rocking onto its shredded tires. Another few minutes passed whilst the woman regained whatever strength she had used up, and she then went to work on freeing her still palsied friend. The seatbelts she wore had not broken, as had Cybil's, though they were rough-sawn along various edges by the vicious metal of the rails, and although the belts had decidedly aided in her survival, she had sustained numerous injuries from the nylon's force in stopping her motion. Burns from the material paraded about her pale flesh, their crimson flags flown high and sickeningly proud. The cop's nerves were for the most part steeled; she had seen individuals in worse condition than Rose currently was. The difference here lay in the fact that none of those she had seen she had personally known.

Yes, the worry she felt over this woman's almost constant actions must have been similar to what the mother had felt for her daughter. Cybil wouldn't know for sure—she had no children of her own. Either way, the instincts to protect had surfaced visibly in the officer; she forced the driver's side door open and dragged Rose out onto the pavement. Once freed, her injuries were more visible, and Cybil's concern was raised to an even greater height. The bandage on Rose's wrist was soaked through entirely in blood, but that was the least of the officer's worries right now. She focused in on the wound on her head. It wasn't bleeding as profusely as she had previously thought, but the very fact that it had resulted in a lack of consciousness made it serious enough. Internal injuries were more than likely present there. Taking out the crumpled bottled water she had in her belt, Cybil opened it and flushed out the cut, just as she had done earlier with the bullet wound. Ripples of motion flashed through the body which lay splayed out on the road, and moments later the mother's eyes flickered open.

Her field of view almost entirely filled by Cybil's head, she jumped slightly, startled, and most likely would have scrambled at least a few feet away, had the cop's hands not pinned her to the ground with a surprisingly strong force for having just been involved in a rather large-scale vehicular accident—even if her injuries were minor. Overpowered by far, and calmed by the familiar sound of her friend's voice, Rose settled, allowing Cybil to finish cleaning the wound, and to place a small scrap of bandage over it. Once she had finished, she questioned the mother, examining her irises and pupils with a penlight, and then at last allowed her to sit up, which Rose did happily. A brief wave of dizziness nearly overcame her and sent her back into the silent realm of unconsciousness, but she managed to fight it off and eventually get to her feet. Exterior injuries littered her body, but none so serious as the one on her forehead, and even this wasn't enough to stop the mother from retrieving the answers she had undoubtedly come in search of. Sharon was still first and foremost on her mind; Cybil couldn't help but admire the determination and will evident in the other woman. She was like some sort of enormous hundred-car freight train, unable to be impeded.

A lost sort of gaze was pitched toward the totaled Jeep; how on earth had she managed to roll it? She hadn't been driving at any ridiculous speeds. Baffled, Rose put a hand to her head and shook it, tipping just enough so that a hand was placed firmly on her shoulder so as to steady her; the concerned tint in Cybil's eye had yet to vanish completely, and she questioned the mother a second time, specifically interested in how she was feeling as far as her head went. Of course Rose answered with an unnervingly unworried tone, and her answer passed off as acceptable. It was one of the many aspects of her character which she had learned to manipulate to her advantage—though only when she truly needed to do so, as she did now. She was generally a truth-telling character, and even complete strangers saw her in this light.

Soft static still emanated from within the confines of the smashed truck, and an instant past, a sharp thud and scrape could be heard; one of the wires anchoring the guardrails to the blacktop let loose; the metal sprung back like a coiled spring, the force of the release hauling the contorted mass of silver and metal and leather with it, and in the blink of an eye the truck had vanished over the edge of the bridge. No sounds were heard that signaled any bottomed impact. It was to be assumed that the vehicle was still falling.

"Shit!"

Rose's voice broke the silence following, and she ripped her shoulder away from Cybil's hand which, until that particular moment, she had forgotten still lay upon the mother's shoulder. Her blue flares torn at the knees and shins, and speckled with red, combined with the ripped collar of her blouse which hung so as to leave part of her shoulder unclothed, the woman was the very picture of one unkempt in a horror-movie fashion. She proceeded to stride in circles, wincing every other step at a brief pang of malaise that pulsed through her left knee and thigh. The onset of infection, perhaps. Cybil, standing nearby, said nothing, but found it more appropriate to remain quiet and allow Rose to come to her own conclusions about what to do and where to go next. Yet remaining in her classic cop-like stance was tiring, and unsettling, and she at last lay hand to the loaded pistol in her utility belt. Weakness and fatigue abruptly swarmed her body, and she sank to the ground, the leather of her pants creaking slightly and almost soundlessly as the motion took place. Rose's attention didn't snap to her friend on impulse, but rather it was a good minute before the mother realized that the normally dominating female was now crumpled on the rough road covering the bridge.

"It's nothing to worry over, Rose," the cop said when Rose opened her mouth to speak. "I'm just a little tired."

"Right," the blonde replied, sounding relieved, but only just. It was discomforting to believe that Cybil was actually _human_, that she had weaknesses and vulnerabilities just as did Rose herself. The mother however, chose not to think about such things if she could help it—she was much more inclined the believe that no matter where she went, or what she did, or what terrors might befall her, the police officer would always be by her side, fully capable and able to fight off those terrors and play the heroine. "But we can't just sit here," she continued with an uptight tone to her voice. "Those…those _things_ could be anywhere. And I, for one, am not comfortable in letting them within fifty feet of me."

Cybil raised her head and gazed up at her with tired eyes, the dark, puffy circles beneath them evident, but her expression was nonetheless one of resignation. Yet again she would chase after the woman with a death wish. Yet again she would put her own life at risk just to be sure Rose's wouldn't be placed anywhere that might greet her with a fate similar to the one that the cop had almost faced herself. Yet again she would watch as Rose turned a blind eye to reality and logic. And all for the sake of her daughter. _Love_ was far weaker a word than could describe what dedication Rose felt toward her family, and the daughter of foreign blood. Shaking her head in a barely noticeable fashion, Cybil made to stand.

A sudden splitting noise cracked the air, and both women felt the ground beneath them shudder. Put in place the fact that they weren't _on_ solid ground, and panic very nearly ensued. The pavement began to crack, and Cybil instinctively made a mad grab for Rose's uninjured arm, seizing it and wrenching her forward as the road literally disintegrated beneath their feet. In the distance the sky darkened to a hideously aphotic violet, and warning sirens screamed to life, their wailing heard for miles around, eventually ceasing only to begin their bleating again. Cybil's clenching hand was the only source of Rose's continued balance, for the pain in her knee was far more extreme when she attempted to gather speed on unsteady footing. As the last bits of the bridge turned to ash before their eyes, the two tumbled onto the edge of the cliff, collapsing to the dirt road, the sirens stopped. Whereas Rose had noticed the darkness turning to ash at the end of each cycle in her previous visit to the town, the bridge had formed ash at the beginning of said cycle. Cybil laid eye on the giant billboard before them, two dim lights aimed down upon its surface, one flickering unendingly. _Welcome to Silent Hill._

An omen?

Never.


	7. And Awaken They Shall

**A/N:** So here's chapter seven, for all of you who've been reading this. I'm planning to make the next chapter have a little bit more action in it, so stay tuned! And reviews—they would be kinda nice. XD

* * *

**Chapter Seven**

Rose groaned quietly from where she had fallen; Cybil lay a good four feet away—at some point her grip on Rose's arm must have been lost. The cop pushed herself into a position so as to look under her arm at the vanished bridge, whose past existence was marked only by an impossibly thick pair of jagged steel beams protruding a few feet from within the vertical earth. Her blue eyes fell on Rose, wide, frightened, and entirely disbelieving.

"Do you _believe_ that just happened?"

Rose glanced at the officer, scrambling into a sitting position, and then cast her eyes in the direction of the same bridge—or rather, the _non-_bridge—that Cybil was so fascinated with. The vanishing of the structure wasn't something that would have been believable in any other place in the world—Silent Hill, however, made such delusions into reality. That was for certain.

"In a screwed up, twisted sort of way, yes," Rose breathed, looking back at Cybil. "It's not really anything new and exciting."

"Well, yes—but honestly—this can't be promising."

"We made it through that—it should count for something."

You're an incredibly illogical and a grossly optimistic woman, Rose."

The glare that was shot in the cop's general direction, only just visible in the dim light of the premature evening, was particularly harsh, though it was brief, having vanished just as soon as it had come. Rose got to her feet; her black boots were scuffed and streaked; her jeans, once a light hue of cerulean, were now splattered with a thick and sticky mixture of ash and mud; her hair displayed a similar pattern of filth, though not in such a great quantity. She stumbled somewhat as she attempted to move, and in the next instant she witnessed the cop literally leaping into the stance worn whenever danger was about. Her pistol was drawn and aimed at something Rose had yet to see; a short scream erupted from the mother's ash-choked throat as the officer touched the trigger and released three shots so unnervingly close to her, that she was entirely able to feel the light rustles of moving air against the exposed flesh of her upper chest. Something crunched to the earth, a figure slumping and shuddering for a few moments, at last ceasing those convulsions with a repulsive squelching sound. Steaming entrails spilled out upon the ground, swollen and cancerous, while brandishing surfaces caked in a gooey, black, tar-like substance. They swelled and popped one at a time, releasing a purple essence which hissed and ate into the ground, and disintegrated the flesh of the fallen entity, whilst unleashing the most foul scent of flesh having been many a day farther into decay than this flesh currently was.

Shying away instinctively, Rose was abruptly snatched and yanked forward; despite the fact that Cybil had nearly pulled her arm out of its socket, Rose was eternally grateful that she had her friend there with her—she had nearly killed herself in that moment of fright. Scrapes from her shoes were present in the thick ash mere inches from the edge of the towering cliff face. Had any of the rocks along where she had been standing given way…a chill swept through her at the thought, and she shuddered involuntarily.

"And you're far too suicidal."

Cybil's voice broke the tense silence, as the two caught their breath from the moment of exhilaration just a short time before. Wrenching her arm away from the cop's hand, Rose stepped backward, ignoring the shooting pain in her knee. She was surprisingly strong, Cybil reasoned as she released her friend's arm, and she wondered just how it was that she could appear so ultimately weak and fragile, yet still have the strength to break the grip of an officer trained to hold on no matter what the cost. Or perhaps it had only been because of Cybil's reluctance to upset her further by not letting her go. Yes, that must have been it. After all, Rose hadn't managed to fight her way out of her hold back on the bridge.

"Can we just get a move on?" Rose's voice spat as she turned her back on the other woman. "I want to spend as little time here as possible, and get home to my kid, and husband in one piece."

Now it was Cybil's turn to glare. Though she said nothing, her words were distinguished by the expression on her face; she didn't approve of Rose's recklessness, but she would nevertheless follow her until she at last satisfied whatever curiosity she was attempting to satisfy. She took a few steps until she stood beside the downed demon, settling the outrageously bright beam of her flashlight upon it, and allowing her face to contort into an expression similar to that of one about to empty the contents of their stomach. With a swift motion, she landed a heavy kick to its side, checking to be certain it was really dead, and then clamped her hand over her nose and mouth as a fresh wave of the putrid stench emanating from the body overwhelmed her.

Rose stood stock still, staring vacantly at the sizzling, acidic corpse which lay unstirring on the ground where it had fallen, and wondering why on earth Cybil had approached the creature, let alone _kicked_ it, and covered her leather boots with imitation tar. Every so often the carcass would shift, an aftershock of the continuous bloating and bursting of the effete excuses for organs, and the mother would flinch slightly. Finally she broke out of her apparent trance and looked to Cybil, her blue eyes questioning her as to when they planned to leave; Cybil, being the more authoritarian of the two, understood Rose's gaze to mean that she intended to, or wished to leave the area as fast as possible. The officer, however, was not so enthusiastic to leave the area, as she stepped away from the rotting being on the ash-tainted earth, and out of the field of stench. She raised her own eyes, the irises a slightly deeper version of the blue that colored Rose's—almost violet, if viewed in the correct light—and frowned at the darkness that had blanketed the town. If they left now, no doubt they would soon be swarmed by the creatures of said darkness, and Cybil's pistol only held so many bullets.

"We can't go just yet. It's too risky. And unless you want to get yourself killed, and leave Sharon for an orphan, I'd suggest you listen to me."

Rose frowned, her eyes narrowing just so, and shook her head.

"I'm not going to just sit here idle, Cybil. I _have_ to figure this out, and I _want_ to do so as fast as possible. Sharon's all alone right now, and I need to get back to her as soon as I can. She's all alone." The mother's blonde hair swung into her eyes as she glanced down once more at the body of the creature in the earthen road, and then boldly stepped around it, breaking into a jog, though only for a few steps, as her knee was paining her greatly. She didn't get very far however, for whilst she had stopped to feel for any signs of swelling in her knee, cold metal suddenly clamped itself around her uninjured wrist.

Eyes widening in surprise, Rose's gaze locked with that of Cybil's, only just visible with the faintness of light; her mouth opened as if she were going to voice her frustrations—or anger, whatever it might have been—but an instant later and it had closed again. Cybil cast her a firm glance, one eyebrow raised peculiarly, and tugged her friend over to handcuff her to the chain link fence lining the roadway.

"Not so fast. We're going to sit down, and wait this thing out. When we can see more than three feet in front of us, we'll go find your answers."


	8. Species Evolution

**Chapter Eight**

"Are you completely out of your mind!" Rose's desperate voice cried out when she realized just what Cybil had done. She pulled against the restraints, the cuff having been attached low to the ground so as to allow her to sit without having her arm drawn up into the air in a decidedly uncomfortable manner—or so she assumed. Her blue eyes careened wildly about the area, the heart in her chest pulsing and trembling with what was quite obviously to be deemed fear; here she was locked to a structure which wasn't easily to be broken, whilst injured and lacking any sort of weapon that might otherwise have been used to defend herself, save for the presence of the officer—the one who had hooked her to the fence in the first place. "If that thing's still alive, or if another one shows up, how exactly are you planning on making sure I get away?" The mother's voice was toned with panic, and she struggled harder against her bonds.

Cybil, who had been facing away from her so as to examine the little surrounding area that was visible, pivoted on one thick, black, rubber heel and strode up to the woman, shoving her in a particularly ungentle manner into a sitting position. "Just relax will you Rose? I'm not going to let anything happen to you. Hence why you're cuffed to the fence in the first place. I can't have you running off and getting yourself killed." Her expression wasn't angry, but rather displaying a sort of anxious fatigue, though it was nearly hidden; now that she was clearly the designated lookout, she certainly wouldn't be able to rest, as she planned on allowing Rose to do. She did however, take the liberty of sliding down with her back against the fence to sit beside Rose, one leg drawn up slightly and the other straight. The pistol, already present in her hand, was stripped of its safety, and the flashlight was swung about so as to be sure no entities were within range as of current. An instant later and the two were plunged into almost complete darkness, when Cybil turned the flashlight off, mumbling something about saving power.

Rose now refused to look at the cop, caught up in her own insecurities and frustrations; but then again, anyone who had just been handcuffed was bound to feel similar emotions. Her scarred face was turned fiercely away, and she unconsciously trembled in her place, likely from fright, the motions causing the links of the cuffs to clank against one another, until Cybil at last grabbed her wrist; Rose's head turned before she could stop herself.

"You're certainly not helping the situation by freaking out," Cybil told her sternly, and released her.

'Twas then at which Rose chose to eject several words used once before on the officer—probably more than once, actually—and her frustrations were plainly seen. The tone used was harsh, but possessed the lightest quality of defeat, as if she knew her words would ultimately have no effect in aiding them, even if they did succeed in releasing some small amount of her fury.

"Fuck you, you stupid cop."

Before Cybil could come up with a response, the creature that lay only a few meters away began to swell in its entirety, the flesh having not already been dissolved by the acidic interior of itself bubbled and tore; the stench, once so unbearable, took on the scent of singed tissues as the corpse literally shredded before their eyes, rising into the air and drifting about; when the woman looked again, the carcass had entirely disintegrated and vanished, and the darkness with it. Once the world was light again, both Rose and Cybil instinctively got to their feet; Rose clanked against the metal of the fence and cast Cybil a particularly heated glare as she continued forward to examine the charred piece of earth signifying the past existence of the demon. A series of tiny but deep holes speckled the area, splashes of the odorous, revolting acid presumably being the culprit.

"Let me out of these things Cybil," Rose called from her place by the fencerow. The cop rounded on her, pulling the keys from her belt, and proceeded to release her friend from the cold metal ring about her wrist. The mother massaged the affected area with her other hand, ignoring the flash of pain which shot through the injured wrist as she did so. When she next looked up, the blonde haired cop was a good fifty feet away from her, the sooty pistol held out before her like a shield, as she darted from place to place, undoubtedly searching for any signs of most unwelcome life. Rose reacted in such a way as any human left alone in such a place would react—she hurried up to match stride after ground-eating stride with her friend, ignoring the additional pain of her knee. How was it she could be so far physically damaged when the two hadn't even begun the worst of their journey? Her mind was cast back to the moments on the bridge; it came to understand just what would have happened to her had she been making said journey alone; unconscious as she likely would have been, assuming the crash had occurred in the same way, she would have lain in the vehicle until it had been hurled off the edge of the bridge by the spring-loaded guardrails; as it went down, she would have still been unconscious, and would no doubt have met her end. Sharon would have been orphaned, lost in the unfamiliar territory of her room, locked within it and barred within it, unable to escape or find help—both due to her entrapment, and the lack of life.

Quite abruptly the mother stepped into Cybil's path, impeding further movement, and threw her arms around the other woman who, looking thoroughly shocked, placed the unarmed palm between the blade's of Rose's shoulder and patted twice in a reassuring manner; Rose jumped away an instant later, apparently realizing the spontaneity of her actions, and sputtered out an apology.

"S—Sorry—But I was just thinking of what would have happened to me if you hadn't pulled me out of my truck."

"Yes…I was kind of surprised considering you were just cursing me a moment ago."

Color found its way into Rose's dirtied face, and for a brief moment she looked truly uncomfortable, ducking her cerulean eyes to the ashen surface upon which her weight lay distributed via two slightly heeled boots, their mahogany surfaces dull and scraped and in the areas of them not protected by the shreds of blue flares, a thick, gritty, clay-like substance found home; when she again looked up, Cybil was grinning down at her from her slightly taller height, but her face returned to its typical stern appearance within a moment. As they began walking again, and passed the open gate in the fence, Rose stuck close behind the woman with the gun, doing her best to keep up on her sore leg. She half wondered what had happened to the rifle—she would have felt much safer if she herself had a weapon—and then realized that it had probably been in the truck, which by this point was either a raging inferno of twisted steel and iron, emitting black smoke from burning rubber, or was still falling into the seemingly bottomless gorge beneath the bridge. Rose became lost in thought a second time, pondering just what she was going to do about the lost vehicle, and how she was going to get back home. The Da Silva's town was a good three hours from Silent Hill, and their house was on the far side of that town. She certainly couldn't walk that distance—assuming she made it out of this place alive.

"…Rose? Rose!"

The mother swung her head around as a shout arose from her left, and froze in her tracks at the sight of an enormous mass of sizzling black goop, into which Cybil had apparently placed foot, and by the looks of things, couldn't get out.

"Rose! Get your ass over here and help me!" the cop cried, holding the gun up in the air as she reached down and tried to pull her foot from the sticky mess. Fumbling, Rose's arms flailed out subconsciously as she dashed toward her friend, who proceeded to hand her the gun, ordering her to shoot the puddle, which was gradually winding its way up the leather boots, and causing the material to boil; a shrill cry was expelled when the substance managed to boil away a particularly thin place in the leather, and touch bare skin; Rose, unquestioning, closed her eyes and aimed the gun at what she presumed to be the ground, pulling the trigger. A short yelp followed immediately after the bullet reached its target.

3


	9. Who's Killing Who?

**Chapter Nine

* * *

**

Under the watchful eye of a stranger, one could be almost entirely certain that the mother Rose had laid bullet to her companion, however unintentionally, resulting in the sharp cry that had been emitted into the air from the young officer's throat; to the more observant stranger, the bullet had missed the cop's foot by mere inches, the shock of which had resulted in the cry. Rose opened her eyes and dropped the gun as the black substance shriveled and disintegrated along the edges of the puddle, and relinquished its acidic hold on Cybil's boot; toward the center of the puddle formed a great lump, which quivered and convulsed, eventually taking the form of an armless entity, whose ribcage stretched the thin covering of skin near to the breaking point, and whose thin, crooked legs twitched and writhed. They had seen its kind before, and though Rose had gathered the general impression that there was only one of said figure, Cybil knew otherwise; when she and Rose had first arrived there in Silent Hill, she had killed a being of similar appearance, and had seen others on their way towards her at the time. It seemed that Silent Hill was home to a multitude of _species_, not only individuals.

The cop fell to the ground as the mass released her foot, tearing off the boot and examining her leg; Rose looked down at the gun on the ground, and realized just how much of an idiot she had been to drop it after firing—the safety naturally wasn't on, seeing as she had just used the weapon, and it could have gone off and caused some serious damage. She was reminded why she had never complained about her lack of a weapon during their previous time in Silent Hill—she would have been more dangerous than the brutes they were trying to shoot. Reaching down and picking it up, she moved to stand beside the hurting woman on the ground, kneeling so that she might better see the damage inflicted, whilst putting the safety on the gun and sliding into the holster as Cybil poked and prodded the opening on her leg. The blue irises that inhabited Rose's eyes watched curiously, though her face contorted into a cringe more than once as the woman continued to examine her injury; the mother marveled in the fact that Cybil could remain so ultimately straight-faced with what must be a painful wound indeed. Obviously the cop wasn't too worried about infection, for she didn't pour any water on it, as she had done on Rose's injuries; the heat of the substance seemed only to have burned the wound shut, for the most part—perhaps this aided in her decision to leave it bandage-free.

Within the next few minutes, the blonde cop reached for her boot, examining it just as she had the wound, and noting the small hole the substance had left in it, and upon seeing it, she let out a snort of disgust and frustration, to which Rose responded by way of an inquiring gaze; quite obviously she didn't understand what would have made the woman apparently care more for her boot than anything else, and although she had said nothing that would have provided evidence to such a declaration, the voice that cut the silence in the next moment did indeed provide that evidence.

"These were custom made."

She held up the boot in a weak gesture of resignation, and then at last slipped it back onto her foot, loosening the laces as she did so and making certain she was able to replace the boot with the least amount of contact with the burn. Once she had finished, she stood, and for a moment glanced about desperately in search of her pistol, only to remember that Rose had returned it to its proper place in the holster; pulling it out, she double checked the safety, and then turned to the mother. Before she could say anything, however, Rose literally leapt into a run, spitting out something which Cybil could not discern; she looked to have completely forgotten the problem with her knee, for she continued running after some unknown entity; Cybil called out after her but to no avail. Rose's figure disappeared around a bend in the road, and was lost to the ashen fog.

Rose's breath came in quick, short gasps as she forced herself to run through whatever pain was shooting up her leg; the form that she'd seen before her was still within her range of sight, fleeing at an alarming pace, and drawing farther away with each passing instant; 'twas not Alessa, no. She had vanished into Sharon now, it appeared. In all truth, Rose didn't even know what she was chasing after, be it friend or enemy, and more than likely enemy; her emotions had gotten the better of her and led her astray, and by the time she finally couldn't stand the pain any longer, she had long since left Cybil behind. Tripping into a walk, she curved her upper torso and placed her hands on her thighs, attempting to catch a few breaths of the poisoned air; once her oxygen supply was satisfied to an acceptable level she spun around with widened eyes, suddenly realizing just what she had done. She'd taken herself out of range of safety; Cybil had a weapon whilst Rose did not; if whatever she had been following decided to change direction and follow her, she'd have no method of defense whatsoever, and she certainly wouldn't make much of an opponent even if she did, seeing as she couldn't run.

Thoughts of Sharon wove their way into her mind, and she half considered dropping everything and fleeing back to the safety, the sanctuary of her home, silent and still and cold though it was, tortured though they were, and lonely though she was. She'd only once thought of her husband since she had been here again in the Hellish pit that was Silent Hill, a town so overcome by the same grief and fear and loneliness as she herself was experiencing, that 'twas almost unthinkable to believe she wasn't comfortable there, where she could relate. But her love for Chris, and her love for Sharon were far too intense to allow her to wish to remain in this place, and as she had decided and undecided, and decided again, she would fight her way until she found the answers she had indeed come searching for, and until she saved her family and had returned to the life she once knew.

Her mind strayed even further with the thought of Cybil, and how she had truly turned death upside down and inside out to return to Rose's side and aide her in whatever foolish journey she aimed to take next; 'twas still just short of surreal to the poor mother's aching mind, having been put through so many trials and sufferings and twisted into the utmost state of total confusion, but she nonetheless went along with it. What else could she possibly have done? She turned around again and walked in the direction of the now vanished figure, noting the fact that she was now in a section of the town she hadn't visited in the past; 'twas an eerie feeling, and one which triggered the adrenaline to be released from the pores of the glands in her brain, flowing vivaciously and purposefully through her veins and arteries, pumping through her heart and gaining energy, placing her into a state of constant alertness and keeping her from falling into the darkness of the unimaginably thick layer of fatigue that had abruptly washed over her.

She strode down the streets with slow, cautious steps, favoring her sore leg and shaking her head at the realization of just how many times she had been injured thus far. Scuffmarks upon the earth led her to a pause in her movements; they were crooked and angled toward a narrow alleyway running between two decaying stone buildings, and lit by a pulsating orange-ish light; she instinctively followed them, if that was the way in which her actions could be described; a smell so foul wafted about the stagnant air of the alley that she very nearly vomited on the spot. She'd smelt it before, when Cybil had shot the beast after the incident with the bridge, and the fear that something of a similar form was within reach of her led the woman to retrieve a shard of broken, tainted glass from the soot-coated cobblestone beneath her feet and hold it out before her as she would have done a blade; though 'twas evidently insignificant, and a poor excuse for a weapon, it provided her with a sense of comfort that had been absent only moments before. She was rather amazed at how severely she was shaken and stirred when beyond the protection of the armed lady deputy.

At the end of the alleyway there lay a door, cracked open to reveal a shaft of the orange light which illuminated her way throughout the smoky air; stepping up to it, the young mother peered around it, the glass still held before her, and, seeing nothing of an immediately threatening nature, kicked it open with her good leg, cursing herself in the same moment for shifting so much weight to the poor leg; no creatures lunged for her upon her entrance, which was somewhat encouraging and reassuring at the same time. The floor beneath her feet was no longer cobblestone, but neither was it the wood or stone material she might have expected just out of everyday experiences—instead 'twas a floor composed entirely of iron grates expanding out over a fiery pit below, much like the one she had scrambled across in the Midwich Elementary School while attempting to flee that creature with the pyramidal cranium. Walking with her legs splayed out to the sides, so as to distribute her weight to the sides of the grates which appeared much stronger—as the centers of some sections were entirely rusted through—'twould have been quite a comical sight for one to spot the blonde haired woman making her way through the narrow hallway of the building.

Her ocean-like eyes shifted so as to see around a corner when she at long last had reached one, and in addition had reached the point where the grate-made floor ended, and was replaced with ash coated marble, a slippery surface she soon discovered, but nevertheless proceeded to cross. Abruptly, a horrid screech was heard as the grates from which she had just removed her weight faltered and failed, crumpling inward on themselves and disappearing into the Hell below; Rose was caught off guard and stumbled, but managed to catch herself on one of the walls. The instant at which her hands were placed against the wall, a spread of vine-like appendages spewed forth, clinging to the surface with crimson tentacles and pulsing growths, like a series of veins composed only of disease; she cried out and ripped her hands from the wall, letting out a short wail of horror at the messes of blood tainted flesh that were her palms. The veins dispersed along the height and length of the wall, and down onto the floor beneath her feet, at last traveling up the other wall and expanding onto the ceiling, entirely encompassing the woman in a tunnel of a living plague; she shrieked again and broke into a weak, limping, stumbling run, forcing herself onward and she found she was not able to keep ahead of the clinging veins.

The swarmed the surfaces and tripled their length and tripled that length, and so on and so forth, until she realized she would not escape the terror they quite obviously had intended to inflict upon her; yet they did not envelope she herself in their escapade, but then, perhaps 'twas because she had apparently been the cause of the spread in the first place. At last there was able to be viewed a light of a variance from the orange and red illumination in the building, and Rose dashed toward it with renewed vigor; there was a moment whereas the earth beneath her seemed to have vanished into absolute nothingness, and then she lay outside, an outrageously strong grip had been placed upon her upper arm and dragged her a good distance from wherever it was she had previously been. She struggled without stopping, kicking and lashing out with her limbs, ignoring yet again the pains which shot through them, and upon feeling her heeled boot connect with something solid, a great dizzying blast swept through her, originating at a particular point on her skull; no doubt she had been bludgeoned; silence ensued, and she knew no more.


	10. Survival of the Fittest

**A/N: **Just a quick thanks to those of you who are reviewing. I'm doing my best to keep up the pace of the story, and as always, I would love comments as to how I'm doing with everything.

* * *

**Chapter Ten**

The scenes that filled the mother's eyes upon a fluttery sort of coming-to were for the most part of the typical Hellish nature of Silent Hill; she was apparently lying in a position suggesting her body had been carelessly thrown to the ground; she felt that her ankles were drawn closer together than was comfortable, and managed to tilt an aching neck and head just so as to lay eye on an impossibly thick, braided rope of clearly ancient heritage which wound its way about her legs a good three or four times. Further restoration of consciousness brought her into awareness of a similar bind about her wrists, which had been placed behind her back as if they were those much-hated handcuffs. Of course, in a way, they _were_ handcuffs—they just lacked the metal property. Experience screamed at her not to move any more than she already had, and to remain quiet, for she didn't know exactly what the environment that currently surrounded her was composed of, but she managed to overcome that instinct and sit up slightly.

The room into which she has been discarded was too dark to allow her to see much beyond the point of her own form; a conical lamp dangled from the ceiling above her, its yellow light dim the source of her ability to see herself; every so often the cord supporting its weight would emit a shower of blue sparks, which failed to burn out before falling relentlessly upon Rose. Now fully awake, the twinges of being burned made her flinch and writhe against her binds, her breathing quickening as her heart did the same. At last she managed to squirm her way out of the path of the flying sparks, and leaned her weight against a wall, which was closer than she had originally anticipated. A sudden bout of claustrophobia swept over her, and she began a strange sort of hyperventilation; soon after a door was abruptly slammed open and another figure stepped into the room. Wishful thinking led her to believe it was Cybil, but as she soon discovered, 'twas anyone but the young cop, the heroine.

"What is it about this town that keeps you coming back, witch?"

The voice was spoken with such harsh tones that Rose mistakenly dubbed the speaker of the male species, but when they stepped into her field of vision, 'twas decidedly female. Her hair was long, and pulled back into a ponytail of perfect proportions with a thick ribbon of blood-caked silk, the casual dress which lined her figure was of the purest white; Rose was rather shocked that there lay not a single stain of any substance upon the material, and, had she not been in a situation where she was bound around the hands and feet and thus forth incapable of movement, she would have taken the opportunity to compliment the woman on her obvious beauty. In the light the mother was currently seeing the visitor in, however, she was anything but beautiful, and was instead a manifestation of the fear that had plagued her since her return to that decaying town.

The woman stepped closer, until she was less than a meter away and staring with a dangerous, unfaltering gaze down at the blonde, who cowered against the wall, and her voice again echoed against the close surfaces.

"I asked you a question, witch. Now speak!"

Rose cast a sharp glare upward, before daring to respond.

"I've come to help my little girl."

"The demon…yes…I thought I'd recognized you. You're the one who contaminated our only sanctuary."

"I only carried out what you'd already brought upon yourselves."

"And destroyed what slim rays of hope might have shined upon my people."

Rose's expression gradually changed from fearful to angry; the woman didn't appear to have any intentions of harming her, aside from the fact that she had her locked in a particularly small, dark room, and virtually immobilized…a rather _large_ 'aside from.'

"Your people never deserved hope," she snapped, her blue eyes flashing, and her voice lowered in a threatening manner.

The woman opened her mouth to speak, but her voice was drowned out by a sudden blaring of sirens, which carried across the lands and through the halls and alleyways, twisting and turning and diving and rising so as to reach every possible ear, and warn every possible victim of the impending danger they were sure to face. Rose's body shuddered involuntarily at the sound; oh, how she _hated_ that sound. Two other figures suddenly joined the two in the room, both of them in the suits of the coal miners whom had captured Cybil during their last visit; Rose let out a sharp cry and threw her shoulder into the particularly sensitive area between the legs of one of said miners; he dropped to his knees, but the other quickly took his place at her side and jerked her upward, lifting her, and throwing her body over his shoulder like one would a particularly heavy sack of flour, or some other grain. Unable to do anything but make the going difficult for him, Rose struggled non-stop as the group dashed for whatever their newest safe-haven was; as they rounded one especially sharp bend in the halls of the building, she slipped off his shoulder and fell to the ground, her lower torso still held firmly, so that only her upper half twisted—a most unpleasant experience indeed—and cracked her already throbbing head against a floor of hard stone.

The miner was hardly kind to her; he picked her up in much the same manner as he had done moments before, slinging her over the opposite shoulder this time, and hurrying to catch up with the woman and the other miner. Rose cried in his ear repeatedly to let her go, though she knew her attempts would be ultimately futile and a waste of energy at best; the sirens ceased their wails whilst the group was still in motion and, Rose presumed, far from refuge. The woman shouted at the men to get into a nearby room, which they proceeded to do in an understandably slim amount of time, and at last Rose's figure was tossed to the floor, and the rusted metal door was slid shut, and an enormous lock slipped into place. The woman raised her head to take in the condition of the room; her gaze fell to Rose, who lay crumpled and heaving to inhale some ever valuable oxygen; immediately after, her voice broke the silence as the paint on the walls began to melt away.

"How far are we from the Library?" she asked, her authoritative voice surprisingly smooth and soft, entirely devoid of the harshness it had contained when she had spoken to Rose previously. One of the miners clicked on a flashlight, shining it about the room, as the other answered.

"Not very far. If it' s necessary, we can make a run for it."

"And we have no need to worry for her safety," the other said, as the beam of the flashlight landed on Rose and they rounded on her with critical expressions, as she in turn stared up at them with desperately lifeless eyes. She couldn't get over the cruelty of the people here. They were almost worse than the beings which roamed during the dark hours.

"She is not to be left behind, Layton."

The miners now turned those same critical eyes upon the woman simultaneously.

"But Galia—what worth could she possibly—"

"Silence. I'll hear no more of it. You'll do as I say, or fend for yourself here."

Rose managed to push herself into a sitting position, and perceived the goings-on with naught but a dense layer of confusion mashed between her brain and understanding. A part of her intently focused on the fact that this woman—Galia, as the named miner had called her—did not anticipate leaving Rose alone, which was both a blessing and a curse in the same instant. Solitude would mean she had a chance for escape; it also meant she would stand a lesser chance of survival. Her conscious was suspicious of just why she was 'not to be left behind;' whether they meant to burn her as a witch later on, or whether they actually planned on aiding her, Rose could not be certain. She only knew that her mind was longing for the company of another whom she could trust without a doubt, and depend on to always be by her side during her times of need. She wondered just what had happened to Cybil, and feared the worst; though the cop could likely handle herself, and she _did_ have a gun, she was out there alone during this darkness, and Rose couldn't stop the constant waves of concern that washed over her as she sat there.

Her arms, still tied behind her back, brushed against the cold steel of the wall, and when she attempted to move her feet, the rope caught on some sort of pipe lodged in the flooring. An idea quickly formed in her head; whilst the group conversed worriedly amongst themselves, the woman repeatedly scraped the rope back and forth against the rusted pipe, gradually tearing away layers of the thick braid. At last the pressure about her ankles was relieved, and blood began to flow through the veins and arteries once more; her legs were now free. Carefully, so as not to be noticed, she shifted her position so that she might repeat her actions with the binds around her wrist, and soon they too were freed.

The miner called Layton abruptly snapped his head in her direction, but her reflexes were faster than his own; she resumed a stance as if she were still bound in the proper places; when he again looked away, she turned her palms out and pressed them to the wall. Instantaneously, a swarm of the same vine like tendrils sprung from her touch, climbing the walls and stretching along all available surfaces, at last reaching the floor and, much to her delight and shock, snatched up the legs of the three people, whilst she herself remained untouched. Taking advantage of their momentary lapse of concentration, she dashed toward the steel door, first attempting to raise the lock by hand, but after failing, resorted to kicking it upward with a great deal more force than one such as her might be expected to be capable of providing; the veins forced their way through the cracks in the door, helping to open it, and at last the door slid into its pocket, and the young mother fled.

Her eyes remained trained on the ground which constantly appeared before her, never looking back to the cries of anguish emanating from the room she had just left; the darkness was so complete that she tripped numerous times during her travels; by this time the pain in her knee had long since faded to a dull, ignorable ache. She skidded to a halt and rounded a turn in the narrow hallway, at last expelling her breath in one enormous exhalation when she ran headlong into a heavy door, and crashed through it out into the street. With nothing to arm herself with, she felt bare and exposed, and all too vulnerable; she continued running as fast as humanely possible, or perhaps more, stopping only when something sounding suspiciously similar to the bay of a coon dog split the silence. She spun around in search of it, but, unable to see anything without a source of light, her actions were useless. Before she even realized what was happening, something had snatched hold of her by the shoulder and covered her mouth, hauling her backward with a great amount of strength, despite her struggles, and into an alleyway, at last pulling her down to the ground beside what looked to be a large dumpster.

Something still covered her mouth for the duration of her struggles; Rose bit down hard on whatever it was, and her head was jerked back to unintentionally hit the brick behind it; all too quickly a loud whisper broke through the barrier panic had placed between the animal and human areas of her brain.

"Jesus Christ Rose!"

Eyes widening, the mother immediately ceased her fighting, as Cybil clicked on her flashlight so as to make certain her friend knew she wasn't in the presence of a less kind being. Rose's chest heaved to and fro as she yet again struggled for air, and the rather inappropriate thought that she would be in great physical condition by the time she left this place drifted through her mind; her eyes remained fixated on Cybil's, as if trying to be sure she wasn't hallucinating.

"It's bad enough I nearly had my leg melted off by God knows what, but _you_ trying to eat my hand is another story altogether."

Shaking her head, the mother at last spoke.

"I—I thought you were Galia," she stammered helplessly, and her form began to tremble violently, to which Cybil responded by rubbing her upper arm in a nearly unconscious manner.

"Galia?"

"Apparently there w-were surviviors-s."

"You met them?"

"They caught me."

As her heartbeat returned to a normal pace, and her breathing to a normal rate, the quaking of her body moved entirely beyond the point of control, and grew steadily stronger until she felt as she often had at home during the times when she had cried; the young cop watched her carefully, her senses on high alert for more than just Rose's health, but also for the presence of any creatures in the darkness. As if on cue, the stench so typical of the darkness began to waft away from them, and the absence of light as well, though it was nearing evening as it were, so the light still wasn't great; the two looked upward as the ash began to rise into the air, though Rose's gaze quickly shifted back to the cobblestone earthen landscape, and Cybil, now able to see more clearly, turned off her flashlight and realized the severity of Rose's apparent fit.

"Good Lord," she voiced worriedly. "You need sleep, Rose. We both do." Her violet eyes skimmed her friends face, taking in the newest cuts and scrapes and bumps, noticing her head in particular, but paying it no mind, as it didn't seem serious. Abruptly Rose slapped one hand against the wall, expecting the same bloody vines to be thrown forth, but to her surprise, they did not. It seemed that it only worked near or during the premature darkness. Cybil watched her peculiarly, tilting her head so as to see her face, and then narrowing her eyes. "What are you doing?"

Rose turned to look at her with bloodshot eyes.

"Nothing. It's nothing—I—I just wanted to see if I was safe."

"What're you talking about?"

"I'll show you the next time, if it works."

Confused, the officer decided it best to let the subject remain where it had come to rest, and leaned her head back against the brick wearily. Rose's shaking had yet to cease, which resulted in her turning her head to look at the determined mother, and speak.

"Try to get some rest, Rose," she told her gently, and though she was very fatigued herself, she volunteered to keep watch. "I won't let anything happen to you, and if the sirens go off again, you'll hear them."

She gripped Rose's hand with her own and squeezed it in a reassuring gesture; this seemed to be enough for the mother, for she almost instantly collapsed, a dead weight against Cybil's side, her head resting unconsciously upon her shoulder and her hair spilling over her eyes, shielding her features from view; the blonde officer, unwilling though she was, settled her own head against that of Rose's, drifting off into a sort of half-sleep, her eyes remaining open only just, and the pistol still loaded in her hand.


	11. You Ain't Nothing but a Hound Dog

**A/N:** Just a pronunciation thing—It's "Guh-lee-a," not "Gah-lee-a." It's not supposed to sound anything like Dahlia. And thanks to all my readers; as always, reviews are appreciated, and this is a pretty actiony chapter, if I do say so myself.

* * *

**Chapter Eleven**

Jolting out of her unintentional slumber, the figure of a young blonde officer could be seen to glance around with an expression of obvious desperation etched upon her features, until her vision came to rest on the form of another woman, who lay with her weight slumped up against a rusty metal rendition of an ancient, fire-eaten dumpster, and whose tattered appearance and pale complexion suggested lifelessness; 'twas not the case however, as the officer soon discovered by way of touching her palm briefly to her friend's arm. No, death in this case was an imposter, and as the cop let out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding, something beyond the alleyway moved. Near as quickly as she had exhaled, the lungs demanded oxygen once again, and refused to release it once it had been sucked dry of its life-giving properties; something that looked to be a member of the canine ancestry was situated in a casual manner just beyond the end of the alley. Only able to see from its shoulders back, the deputy leaned cautiously outward to peer around the dumpster.

The horrifying excuse for a dog which sat idly in place would have made any non-professional shriek with surprise and fear; Cybil, however, having extensive training on what not to do in certain circumstances, ducked back behind the dumpster and out of view of the creature. Its misshapen head abruptly craned around in a snapping motion at her hasty retreat, and in the next instants a padding sound drifted through the air and around the end of the dumpster; Cybil's senses shifted to high alert mode, and she stared unblinkingly as something of crimson hue slithered its way around said dumpster—a dry, scabby tongue of nearly three feet in length, so long that it dragged upon the ground—followed by the form of an enormous canine nearly four feet at the shoulder, caked in half-singed skin and patches of coarse, raggedy fur, caked in crusty blood, and whose sloping spine gave it more of the appearance of a hyena than a dog. The cop froze as the cracked skin of its muzzle breathed into her face; where its eyes should have been, the flesh appeared to have been melted or burned solid, effectively blinding it. The tongue rose off the ground, laying itself against the leather boots, and sliding up her legs until it touched her stomach, and chest, and lastly her neck and face.

She moved naught but the violet eyes as the creature examined her, which swiveled about to witness Rose's form stirring in the classic signs of awakening; she could do nothing to stop her should she open her eyes to see the creature which currently had the slick gums of its mouth against the flesh of Cybil's face and was nearly making her vomit, its actions unimpeded thanks to the decaying tissue, which caused a lift in the lips in a permanent gesture of teeth-baring; after what seemed an eternity the blue of Rose's irises were to be viewed, she let out a shriek, to which the animal responded by way of a ferocious roar more alike that of a wildcat's than a dog's. It leapt backward in surprise, freeing Cybil, but before she could raise her pistol to put it out of its misery, Rose charged forward with a large slab of stone, slashing it across the tongue and dropping it on the creature's skull. A thud and a sloshing crunch were heard as the stone impacted the cranium and brought it to the ground, the force of which propelled the skull into an outward burst; brown, steaming brain matter suddenly drenched the cobblestone below; the section of the tongue having been severed from the main body thrashed about, refusing to die, until Rose at last retrieved the same stone—much to Cybil's shock—that was entirely covered with entrails, and smashed it upon the tongue, causing it to finally cease its movements.

She stood there for a long moment, just staring at her work; whether she was admiring of it, Cybil was uncertain, though she didn't think that was the case presently; the mother eventually broke from her apparent trance, shaking her head and allowing herself the delayed reaction of complete and utter panic to unveil itself. She flung herself against the brick side of the building and pounded half-heartedly and futilely upon it with one fist—the one on her injured arm—and continued to do so for a good minute, repeating indiscernible phrases until Cybil got to her feet and caught Rose's arm in mid-beat, spinning her around to face her, and successfully bringing her back down to earth. Or wherever they were.

"You're going to do more damage that way, Rose," she snapped sharply, releasing her almost as soon as Rose was fully pivoted, and stepping back, avoiding the body of the dog behind them. "Save your energy—I'm willing to bet you'll need it for whatever your next predicament is. And don't go running off like that again! You're just like your daughter."

"I was doing just fine until you nearly took my head off," Rose retorted smartly, stamping one dusty black heeled boot for effect.

"Oh, like I _wanted_ to get my hand bitten while in the process of getting you out of the path of that…_thing_?"

Rose sighed resignedly, and held up her hands in a gesture of defeat. The bandage on her wrist likely could have done with a changing, but seeing as they weren't in a particularly safe area, as far as they could see, neither of them mentioned it. Instead an uncomfortable silence followed; they hadn't been arguing especially heatedly, but 'twas enough to leave both at a loss for the proper words and resulted in the quiet present there during those few moments. At last Rose shattered that silence into a billion tiny shards of glass with her overly determined and anxious manner of going about things; the tones which she vociferated in the next instant or so were calm and collected, despite her outer shell's appearance, and she started for the street, walking cautiously lest there be any more…surprises…and upon reaching the end of the alleyway, she turned back to make certain Cybil planned on following.

"Are you coming or not?"

The cop tipped her head back in an expression of frustration, but nevertheless trod up to stand before the woman, her gun held in a position which signaled its readiness to unleash a hail of bullets on anything that dared to threaten the two of them; Rose was briefly unable to see when the officer leaned out to gaze around the area of the surrounding street; two brief, short, and strikingly meaningful word was released into the air as she did so.

"Oh…._shit_."

Rose looked at her questioningly, and started forward, but Cybil threw out an arm to block her path; she was not quick enough to prevent the mother from catching a quick glimpse of the source of the deputy's cursing; Rose gasped and backed up quickly, shaking her head and muttering to herself. Cybil's eyes stayed locked onto the source, however, and she considered shooting, but thought better of it when she remembered she didn't have enough bullets to try emptying them into the skulls of the beasts which lay scattered across the landscape before them.

Seven, maybe eight of the same monstrosities as the one which Rose had just disposed of lay upon the ground, apparently sleeping, their dreadfully long red appendages lay twisted about on the ash-caked earth, only occasionally shifting their positions; when they did so, Cybil was able to see their scab encrusted surfaces crack and break even further; flakes of rotting tissue peeled off as the tongues ran along the ground, as if tasting it, floating into the air only to be drawn back to the hellhounds as if by static electricity; once near enough, the flakes clamped onto the skinless patches and bubbled ferociously for a moment before steaming and turning into black patches from which hair began to sprout almost instantaneously. As if the creatures possessed their own sort of recycling system, large clumps of hair already having been grown fell to the ground and turned to ash.

Cybil backed up and leaned against the side of the alley not obstructed by the presence of the dumpster, dropping her gun hand to her side and staring blankly at the ground for a long moment, no doubt considering just what she and Rose should do in order to make it out of the situation without any missing limbs; the memory came to her that the other canine had been blind—perhaps the same would be true for the others of its kind; she removed her weight from the wall again and looked out at the four-legged troops, noting that one of them was now on all fours, each bloody excuse for a paw planted firmly and squarely upon the ground. She watched with an aggravated, weak, and churning gut as the apparent sentinel retracted its meter-long outermost extremity into the depths of its putrid mouth; she half wondered if it wasn't the creature's esophagus flipped inside out; closing her eyes at the image formed in her head, she turned her face away for the briefest of moments, only to return to gazing at the animal who had forthwith turned its head in her direction, just as had the other before, only in this case 'twas an action worthy of much greater alarm—this canine could _see_ her.

Her heart bounded into her throat and she sprung back, seeming glued to the wall, her chest heaving as she tried to catch her breath, prevent hyper ventilation, and panic as well, from seeping into her very thinly formed bones. She cocked the pistol, ready should the beast find its way to she and Rose, and as she did so, a boisterous bray echoed and bounced off of the surrounding structures, searching until it at last found its way to and pierced the unwelcoming ears of the two woman. Rose dropped to her knees and clapped her hands over her ears in a manner similar to the way she had done both at home after opening her daughter's bedroom door, and as she had done in the Liberty before it had spun out of control; Cybil managed only to cover one ear, as the other was occupied by the soot-cloaked pistol, and within moments she had chanced another glimpse of the disease-ridden dogs' gathering. Each and every one of them were standing now; each and every one of them seemed to be staring straight at her, their repugnant tongues sliding and slurping against the ashen landscape; drops of frothy tar dribbled from their muzzles, descending downward in thick purple strings until they at last touched the ground and snapped, splattering about. The sentry let out another bellow, forelimbs lifting off the ground as it did so, the tongue swishing about wildly, as if it were a tail; Cybil at last came to the realization that 'twas _only_ the sentry which was fully able to see, for all the others possessed the same flesh-sealed eyelids as had the one Rose had killed. At last she left her post at the wall and grabbed Rose by the upper arm, hauling her to her feet and speaking to her quickly.

"We're gonna have to make a run for it. Only one of them can see us—I'll take it out if it gets too close, but otherwise I'd rather not waste the bullets," the officer informed the mother in her typically authoritative tone, every so often checking behind them so as to make certain they weren't being distracted and ambushed.

Rose's eyelids fluttered as the howl broke through the air once more, and she flinched, but not to the point of losing her composure a second time. Her widened blue eyes landed on Cybil's briefly, as if she wasn't sure her friend was real, and then she strode forward and out into the street to better see what had them both so spooked—_too_ far into the street. The hellhounds spotted her, somehow, and the guard let out a snarl which sounded so similar to that of a puma, it caused Cybil to falter in her dash for Rose, and she took an instant to glance in the direction of the sound. Once removed from her steadfast position, the cop made a mad grab for her friend, only to find that she had already bolted off; she was impossibly quick for having a hurt leg, Cybil reasoned, and as she fully exposed herself via the open street, several of the monstrosities broke into great, leaping gallops; their enormous forms pulled ever closer to her and their strides literally swallowed the ground beneath them; one leapt at her and the woman was forced to drop into a roll in order to evade its deathly sharp, talon-like claws.

She suddenly realized just what she had done. Unable to make it to her feet in time due to the slippery ash coating of the earth, the blonde was now a prime target for the two creatures whom hadn't made the leap at her before; one of them surged at her before she could stop it; two paws were slammed down upon her stomach and she was held immobile beneath its lumbering bulk, virtually incapable of breathing. Its claws slit through the thin material of her shirt, and she cried out when they sank into the soft skin beneath, soaking the front the shirt with a deep, nearly black scarlet. She didn't struggle, for fear of intensifying the wound, and sooner than she could have ever possibly deflected it, the colossal tongue-like limb lifted itself upward and struck out like a viper, boring into the area between her collar bone and left shoulder, miraculously missing her heart muscle. The scream of anguish that was emitted from her throat apparently spooked the animal, and it flinched, slicing part of its limb on her sheriff's badge, which in turn resulted in its ripping the tube-like appendage from the wound.

In the next instant, the brute let out a yelp, having been cracked on the side by a large brick; another's neck was snapped by way of an enormous metal pipe, and the third was pierced through the paw by the same pipe, effectively fastening it to the ground; the young blonde cop was literally dragged from the scene, through a doorway and into a room; the iron door was clamped shut and locked. The hands of her protector were removed, and Rose's face came into view; Cybil took no notice of the room into which she had been lugged until another voice besides that of Rose came about.

"You're very lucky to have had a friend here."

Cybil sat up, Rose crouched worriedly by her side, one hand on the cop's arm both for balance, and so that she might look at the wound, which was far more serious than anything she'd seen before that point. The officer's tones were suspicious, and this was plainly displayed in her response.

"By the looks of things I have more than one," she gasped, her shoulder and midsection paining her beyond belief. "That is of course you're one of those religious, witch-burning zealots. Who the hell are you?"

"Galia," the woman answered softly, looking quickly to Rose, who stared up at her with the same suspicion as had Cybil. "Lady Christabella's only spawn."

Cybil and Rose looked at each other simultaneously, reading one another's eyes as if each one was to provide a proper reply, but nothing came; the miners suddenly appeared behind Galia, blundering sticks in hand; one of them spoke, and by his voice, Rose recognized him to be Layton.

"Have you ever considered why the demon-child wanted her so badly?" he asked Cybil, who only stared back with lifeless eyes.

"She sinned in the same manner as did Dahlia," said the other miner. The two chose to remove their masks, revealing surprisingly youthful faces; Layton's hair was a deep ebony, and longer, giving him an almost feminine characteristic, whilst the other's was brown and scruffy. Both had green eyes, as did Galia. Cybil imprinted the faces into her memory, and Rose as well; she didn't know if she would ever need to remember in the future, but in case she did, she would be knowledgeable as to what they looked like.

"I was cast out," Galia broke in, looking at Rose, "In much of the same manner as was that demon-child. My mother told no one of my existence, and during the times I was repeatedly denied entry to her sacred church, I had gathered my own followers. We thrived whilst my mother's side slipped farther and farther into that Hell, finally falling entirely when you provided the demon-child with a way to enter the church. Her revenge was never directed at myself, for I had been subject to the same discrimination as she, hence why I survive today. She didn't know I'd salvaged others from the fate she intended to bestow upon all those but her mother and I, which is how _these_ two survive." She gestured to the miners, who looked slightly uncomfortable at their late introduction.

"Are there others?" Rose inquired from her position at Cybil's side.

"Quite a few, actually," the unnamed miner replied.

"They're some in the upper stories of this library," Galia continued, glancing upward subconsciously. "The rest are scavenging, I'm sure. When the sirens announce the terror's return once more, this room will fill itself."

The woman's hand pushed open a second door behind her, revealing a mid-size expanse; dirtied carpet lined the floor, and shelves upon shelves of books towered to the ceiling some twenty feet above. At the far end could be seen a fireplace of monstrous proportions, though 'twas blocked off with a presumably weighty metal grate across its fire-pit. From the ceiling hung a great chandelier of rusted brass and diamond, although several sections appeared to have been either mangled by fire or damaged by human hands; its base took the appearance of a large hand with its palm against the roof, and the symbol on the church steeple etched into the brazen skin which lined the back of the hand. It was slightly disturbing, yet unendingly beautiful in its curiousness; neither Rose or the injured cop could seem to decipher its symbolic meaning however--if it had any.

Cybil lay back down a moment past, letting out a barely audible groan of pain as she did so, and Rose's attention was fully shifted back to her. She didn't know whether or not she could fully trust their acquaintances, but she decided that for the time being at least, she would have no other choice. She raised her eyes to Galia's but before she could voice a request, the woman had already spoken.

"There is a room on the far end of this gallery. You might find rest there." She looked at Cybil with narrowed eyes. "Her wounds will need tending to."

Rose cast her a probably undeserved glare, and stood up as Layton and the still un-introduced second miner made to lift the cop; Cybil was in no way trusting of them, however; she struck out with her good arm and clocked Layton on the leg with her pistol, snapping testily that she would walk, if only they would lead the way. He frowned noticeably at her, his eyes catching Galia's briefly; she only nodded, and turned to climb the three or four steps through the doorway and into the main area of the building. The miners joined her; Rose tried to help her friend to her feet, but was scolded in the same way as were the miners—minus the physical attack on the legs. She looked at the cop curiously, her sea-blue eyes shifting every so often to take in their surroundings as Cybil stood, and they followed after the others.

"I don't dare allow myself to trust them."

"They're all we've got right now Cybil."

"She's that lunatic's daughter. There's no way in Hell I'm trusting her."

Rose sighed, decided it best not to waste their energy on pointless arguments. They traveled between the towering shelves of books, and the young mother couldn't help but wonder just what stories those books held; what information she might gain by reading them; whether they could help explain her daughter's vicious ailment. The town's history was likely to be found buried deep within the yellowing pages of those texts, their written words explaining all-too-thoroughly the answers to the questions she had been longing to speak aloud and receive satisfaction when their mysteries were correlated and solved. Oh, she did indeed miss her daughter so, but her time here was to save her Sharon from the suffering which had been lurking in the depths of her small body for far too long. As had become the norm, her musings were cut short by their arrival at the room which Galia had spoken of and apparently offered to them.

The door was opened to unveil a sort of office, a fireplace in one corner and a desk in the other; a twin bed was placed haphazardly against one wall, its frame crooked and the springs beneath literally rusting away; a small couch was placed forward to the fireplace, its cushions warped and the material 'twas composed of had singe marks in it. It was a rather ugly shade of green, and the remainder of the study followed much of the same basic color scheme; the room was not at all pleasant to be in, but at least it was safe from the darkness—or so Galia had said.

"If you need any assistance, please just ask," the woman in the white dress said calmly, her gaze aimed pointedly at the wound on Cybil's shoulder. "You should both try for some additional rest…I daresay what little you have already received was nothing of what you needed, and still need."

Neither of the women chose to question as to just how she knew they had slept—it was rather unimportant, in the grand scheme of things. The miners flanked Galia as she turned to leave, her figure disappearing into the rows of books, and leaving Rose and Cybil alone. Rose noted that while she had offered aide, should they need it, Galia had failed to inform them as to just where she would be, whether 'twas inside the building or out; she made the quick decision not to worry over it, for she was certain that between she and Cybil's minds, they would need no further assistance. She rounded to face her friend, but saw that she had already made her way over to the couch and had lain down, though not after ensuring the safety was once again in place on her pistol. Rose closed the door, making her way over to sit on the end of the couch closest to the cop's head. She looked down at her to see her eyes were closed, not in slumber, but in weariness; when they opened, they widened in surprise at Rose's presence, but relaxed an instant later, presumably having decided there were no giant hounds from Hell in the vicinity.

"Okay," Rose began, her entrails contracting as she caught a particularly clear glimpse of the other woman's injuries. "Shoulder or stomach first?"


	12. A Separate Peace

**Chapter Twelve**

Cybil visibly cringed at the sound of Rose's voice, though not for such reasons as merely hearing it, but rather hearing the way in which she chose to organize the words into a particularly unpleasant sentence; her violate-blue eyes stared up at the mother's above her, the grim expression present not only in them, but in her face as well; at last she heaved a deep sigh and declared that it would be best to attend to the shoulder injury first, as it was the more serious of the two. Nodding, Rose took the water bottle which was offered to her not a second later; Cybil instructed her to treat the wound by flushing it out—it seemed to be her answer to everything—which Rose proceeded to do immediately. Tipping the bottle so as to allow a steady but solid stream of the life-giving liquid, the cop sucked air in through clenched teeth at the sharp stinging sensation that accompanied the cleansing, whilst doing her best to keep still.

Once she had finished flushing the wound—and made sure to keep some of the water for further cleaning—Rose requested whatever remaining bandages Cybil had with her, the number of which were few; only a few ragged pieces were offered to her, but the woman made the best of them, using the already half-removed sleeve of her blouse as a way in which to keep the bandages in place. There were still enough left so that she might keep the cuts she knew were present on the woman's midsection covered as well, so long as she gave up another section of her blouse, which she had no problem with. The mother worked for a good few minutes more, listening to Cybil whenever she had instructions for her, and eventually the puncture was sterilized to the best of their current ability, and the sleeve of Rose's blouse looping about the cop's neck and under her arm so as to keep the bandage in place. Once finished, Rose stood up, and Cybil pulled a shabby pillow underneath her head.

"Should we fix up your stomach now, or do you want to wait a few minutes?" Rose inquired with a concerned tint to her voice, though it wasn't overly detectable. Her question was logical—Cybil might want to wait for the pain to subside from the last 'operation' before subjecting herself to another. Much to her evident surprise, however, Cybil shook her head, and gestured to the water bottle on the ground.

"Pick it up."

Understanding completely, Rose snatched the bottle as the cop slid her shirt up so as to allow the cuts, which lay around the very middle of her belly—one claw had even sliced into the bellybutton itself—to be flushed out and bandaged in much of the same way as had been done to her shoulder. As was to be expected, she hissed at the pain involved in the process, but 'twas brief. Rose at last returned the nearly empty bottle to her friend, who, having now managed to move herself into more of an upright position, slid it into a pocket of her utility belt and dropped her head back against the arm of the couch.

"That'll get infected."

The cop shook her head despite its laying against the armrest as she did so.

"I'll be okay. What I want to know is just why those things were running around in broad daylight. Everything else seems to come around _after_ the sirens."

"I couldn't give a damn about whatever the Hell those things were or what they were doing there. I just want to get home to my kid in one piece."

Cybil chuckled, her eyes closing as her head remained drooped in a rather uncomfortable looking position on the couch. She couldn't help but admire the fact that the fire within the Da Silva woman never even once flickered in consideration of failing to burn. It was always burning, no matter what the circumstances. Had Cybil been in her place, she knew she would have given up a great many days before. That must have been why she had never been graced with children, she decided. Her thoughts meandered about until they at last landed on the woman and the miners who appeared to be her bodyguards; she didn't trust them, but they had provided them with a safe haven, for the time being. Or so it seemed. The young cop couldn't help the worry that was present during the procession of her ponderings; she feared that at any moment something was going to happen that would signal yet another betrayal such as had been seen by the lady Christabella.

Sitting up at the sound of light shuffling, Cybil laid eyes on the sight of Rose crawling atop the bed in the far corner of the room; she patted the pillows cautiously before laying her head on them, no doubt checking for insects or other unwelcome critters or substances. She couldn't seem to settle herself, however, for a moment later she was standing by the headboard and dragging the bed across the room. Curious, Cybil continued watching, noting the fact that her friend was able to bear the pain of whatever injuries she had thus far sustained, and half wondering how she managed to do so at the same time. It obviously wasn't the fact that the injuries weren't serious; the hole in her jeans knee and the numerous tears which speckled the remainder of the material revealed open cuts and countless bruises; whilst Cybil herself had been lucky as of current and wasn't marred with a particularly great amount of minor scrapes, the injury to her shoulder and midsection made up for it. She'd shaken her head at Rose's declaration that infection would come to the puncture of her collarbone area, but inside she'd known her friend was correct. In fact, the cop would be lucky if she ever regained full use of her arm.

"What are you doing?"

The calm but inquiring tones wafted about the room for a moment or two before reaching Rose's ears over the heavy scraping of the metal legs of the bed upon the wooden floor; she proceeded to look up at the cop briefly, halting for a moment, and then continuing to move it until it was only a couple of meters from the couch upon which Cybil lay. Apparently satisfied with her work, Rose climbed back into it and rested atop the coverings; undoubtedly she preferred such over blanketing herself in ash-caked cloth; once and finally settled, her sea-blue eyes traveled back to the officer and she spoke.

"I don't like the idea of being that far away from the only other person I trust here."

Smiling, Cybil shifted her position back to that of which it had been a minute or so ago, this time choosing to rest her head on the small excuse for a pillow that rested against the arm of the surprisingly comfortable but entirely grotesque couch. It would have been nice if the town allowed them moments such as these more often, but alas, they were hated and hunted, and nothing they did or said or discovered would ever change that fact; this Hell had a warrant for their captures and tortures; as much as she refused to believe it, the blonde officer knew all too well that the chances of both she and Rose surviving a second visit here were ever so slim. Of course, she would never tell Rose such a thing; it wouldn't be right for Cybil to take out her own insecurities upon the only person who had willingly been taken under her arm and had accepted her as something other than just an overly-protective police officer; she hated the thought of sending Rose into the same state of depression and worry that she had been engulfed by since the day that madman had thrown that innocent boy down the mineshaft just a few short years ago.

People were stupid. People were stupid and people were cruel, and that was the moral of this place. It wasn't meant as a means of dragging anyone it could into its boiling, magma-filled depths; it wasn't meant as a means of torturing whatever or whoever happened to enter into its domain for the mere pleasure of doing so. No, the meaning of Silent Hill was much deeper than that. This town, once so quiet and lovely, had been transformed by the evil and stupidity within its occupants, had made its way to become a barely-living symbol of that evil and stupidity, and those who managed to fall into its grasp were to be shown just what could happen were they to commit the very same or similar sins as did the founders of Silent Hill.

Her face must have shown something of her emotions and thoughts, because Rose's voice broke the brief time of silence, filtering through the dust-laden air loud and clear.

"You scare me when you're so quiet."

"You'd rather not know what I'm thinking."

"And why's that?"

"I'd not like to be the one responsible for your stubbornness failing you."

To this, the mother was silent, focusing her eyes on the floor rather than Cybil, slightly unsure how she was supposed to respond. Or perhaps she hadn't been meant to respond. It wouldn't have been the first time--that was for certain. She pressed her head more deeply into the putrid looking pillow, sighing in acknowledgement of the facts. At times this place could seem so awful, while at others, 'twas the only place she could ever have imagined being, or wanted to be.

The absolute sense of peace, which filled the room to the brim, was something the two had been longing to reach for far too long; the soft fabric of the sentiments it evoked from within their weary minds thread its way throughout the room, weaving in and out of the quilt on the bed and the fibers of the couch, sifting and winding about the legs of the furniture and drifting up alongside ancient curtains to decorate the broken windows, at last allowing itself to dance before them like a particularly lovely silken ribbon of serene blue. Tranquility was no longer concealed; the stillness of the room and the presence of another were enough to convince them both of the fact that a world beyond this Hell did exist, that the road to perdition was able to be avoided should they try hard enough. For now, Silent Hill lived up to its name. All was quiet on the western front.


	13. History Will Repeat Itself

**Chapter Thirteen**

Neither of the women who lay on their makeshift beds had slept, as might have been expected. It had been determined that sleep in such a place was impossible after the events which had occurred just a short time before. Even though they were temporarily within the confines of a safe haven, relaxation failed to come about. The form of the officer lying sprawled out on the couch in a position that signaled she was hurting could be seen, as could the figure of a certain woman by the name of Rose Da Silva, whose manner of resting was only slightly less troubled. Quite plainly sleep was something they both needed plenty more of, but 'twas also quite plainly something the Hellish town of Silent Hill would allow them the privilege of drifting into. Rose turned on the mattress of the old spring bed to face the couch upon which Cybil lay, and her mind wandered.

This woman had played the heroine far too many times for Rose's tastes; while she wasn't actually _happy_ about the fact that she now possessed an injury equal in magnitude to that which Rose herself had sustained in the impossible large scale crashing of the Jeep, she was pleased to have been able to offer some sort of service in return to the many Cybil Bennett had made it her duty to provide to Rose. But then, she was a cop, after all. Her kind had been trained just how to handle each and every situation that might arise; her kind had been forced through the most rigorous of educations ever offered; her kind had literally been seasoned to place the basic human instincts to self preserve and protect oneself at all costs aside, and to replace it with the instincts befalling another, less educated individual, such as Rose herself. Cybil Bennett's nature was to keep every other human being within her reach alive, and to almost entirely disregard she herself in the matter.

It was unfathomable to the young mother, as she propped her body up by an elbow and stared at the floor; it was impossible for her to understand just how her friend was able to continuously resist that most primitive and primeval instinct's desire to surface; even more so, 'twas impossible for her to comprehend just what would make a person do such a thing of their own free will. But then, perhaps it wasn't such an enigmatic occurrence after all; Rose recalled the times she had put herself in harm's way in order to ensure her daughter's safety, and her husband's as well. That was a different set of circumstances though. Sharon and Chris were family; Rose's life revolved around that family, and nothing more. Each and every thing she did or said left a trail that, should one follow it far enough, would eventually link her back to that family. Cybil Bennett, however, was only just short of being named a stranger to Rose. She knew nothing of the officer's past; she knew nothing of the family she might have herself, nor her likes and dislikes, nor her interests; the only knowledge she might be credited with possessing on the feisty cop would be her understanding of the woman's intelligence. Nothing more.

Movement captured Rose's attention; Cybil seemed to have realized she was being watched—or at least that she had been under the sea-blue gaze just a few moments before; her head turned to stare back at the mother with a questioning guise in the violate irises, but her countenance was generally calm, save for an occasional cringe. The injury to her shoulder throbbed painfully, though she did her best to keep the fact silent; sitting up, the cop made to get to her feet a minute or so past; once standing, she tottered a bit, but only slightly. Striding over to one of the web-cracked windows and tilted her head at an angle so as to view the smoke-hazy atmosphere which blanketed the town; Rose watched from her place on the old bed, and, having nothing better to do, swung her legs over the edge of the mattress and placed the heels and toes of her knee-high boots on the singed wooden floor paneling. She stared at them for a minute or so, seemingly lost in thought, but lifted her head when Cybil's voice cut the silence.

"We should get going sometime soon you know."

The mother said nothing, and instead, she merely resumed staring at her shoes anxiously; the cop pivoted quickly on one heel and took not but three steps before she had placed herself directly in front of Rose, and had bent her head to look down at the other woman with a stern expression on her voice.

"You better not be thinking of giving up," came the authoritative tones from her throat, and Rose glanced up. It was the first time in quite some time that she had heard such austere resonance coming from her friend; it was unnerving, to say the least—Rose knew very well just what sort of power the officer held over her physically—and though she would have been thoroughly shocked had Cybil chosen to use force in order to convince the young mother to push onward and find the answers she was looking for, in a way, it wasn't something that could be totally eliminated as a possible occurrence. The threatening nature of her voice that moment caused a barely detectable tremor to pass through Rose's small frame; too many times here she had been subjected to those wicked tones—albeit they had come from nonhumans—and she wasn't pleased to be subjected to anything similar in nature to said tones more than once.

"Rose?"

"You have problems with patience, don't you?"

"When it comes to you, yes."

"You've had nothing _but_ patience with me, Cybil. With the number of times I've nearly gotten us killed, you can't have had anything else."

Cybil smiled faintly, but it faded the instant sirens rang through the air, sounding closer than ever before. The small hands immediately found home on the pistol and ripped it from the holster to hold it out before the blonde, like a knight brandishing a finely crafted sword. Rose froze for a moment, and then looked in the direction of the ceiling of the office; the sirens sounded to be atop the library, which would make sense, considering this was the newfound refuge for the townsfolk; her gaze dropped to the floor a moment later before she scurried over to the desk, pulling open drawers desperately, and dropping them to the wooden floor below after she had finished searching them. A slip of paper fluttered to the surface of the mahogany desk, and was partially concealed by several others doing the same; Cybil turned only her head to shout over to the mother and question her actions; Rose answered only by removing a rather large syringe from one of the drawers cautiously. The cop's face contorted in a strange and worried way; Rose's sights shifted to the papers on the desk and she reached for the one upon which was written in formal script some sort of number—or part of it, at least. One chunk of the paper had been singed, hiding the rest of the number from view.

By that time, Cybil had moved up to open the door of the office in order to see if Galia and the miners were anywhere within the vicinity; Rose had spent a minute or so contemplating the possible meanings the numbers on the paper withheld; she now dashed up to follow Cybil as she strode out into the open air of the monstrous library, placing the capped syringe in her pocket and the paper as well. She could hear footsteps in massive numbers echoing throughout the monstrous size of the library, ricocheting off the towering shelves of literature and escaping into the darkening air through the grate-marked fireplace and the chimney attached to it. The woman in the white dress was easily visible amongst the sea of greys and browns of the townsfolk's coverings.

Something, or someone, quite abruptly attached their arms around her back and upper arms, dragging her forward more quickly, though with the strength of her struggle, it would have been presumably faster to simply drop her and leave. Her shriek drew Cybil's attention, and upon sighting the face of the unnamed miner, she shouted something aloud and shoved him off of Rose, whose weight was instantaneously transferred onto the officer; her good arm withstood the light mass to the best of its ability and nothing more; Rose was pushed easily back to her feet before she had even realized she was by Cybil, and not the miner. The officer cast a rough glare at the miner, who had stopped temporarily, just as they had done in the momentary lapse of attention to more important things.

"She's perfectly capable of walking herself, you know."

"She was too close to the walls."

Rose looked between them, her small figure still perched close to that of Cybil's purely out of instinct; shaking her head she reached out and pushed her friend smoothly into motion once more; the cop looked behind her to see the wall as unscarred as it had been upon their first entry there. Rose suddenly tore her hand away from the place just below her friend's shoulder, taking several steps away from her in the process. Their eyes met briefly and with a shake of Rose's head; she would explain later, the look seemed to say; reaching the group of people whom had gathered together in a semicircle around the enormous fireplace, some could be seen on their knees and weeping, others standing solemnly nearby. There weren't nearly as many as had been in the sacred church under Christabella's watchful eyes; but then, Galia, whom was decidedly the leader of the procession judging by her presence at the front and center of the mass, had described herself an outsider; who was to say these people were anything other than outsiders themselves as well?

Cybil's pistol remained within the view of the surrounding townsfolk, and they watched her warily; she was comfortable with that fact, however. She would much rather they feared her and stayed away, than not fear her and attempt to burn her as they had done before. Galia stood at the front of the group with her arms extended down and her palms pressed together in a gesture that might be considered a praying posture; yet she did not bow her head, or give any other outward indications of such suspicions lying true; instead she merely gazed out upon the relatively small group and watched idly as several fought to close the heavy door which marked the entrance to the library. At last they had succeeded, and the sirens failed and silenced themselves; Rose came to stand beside Cybil, though she kept the distance between them wider than necessary.

Ordinarily, the mother mused, she would have stuck close to the seemingly indestructible cop's side; when the library filled with darkness, however, she refused to do so, having learned from her past experiences in the premature night that anything she touched became infested with the vine-like appendages that had saved her from whatever fate the woman Galia and her followers had planned to bestow upon her. She might appreciate the…her own, rather…gesture when she was in danger; she didn't want to mistakenly set the demonic, plant-like organisms after Cybil, and so, she made sure to keep her hands at her sides and to place herself at least two meters from her friend at all times. Her attention wavered momentarily when an elderly man brushed past her with surprising speed and drew the faded and smoke-stained curtains of an extremely large window shut, and then proceeded to stride about the main gallery, repeating his actions on three other windows. The group of people seemed to swell with apprehension before her eyes.

"C'mon," Cybil urged from alongside her, nodding in the direction of the gathering. "We'd better see what they're up to."

Rose nodded docilely, trekking after the officer as she moved, and stopping when she did, undoubtedly at the commotion which had arisen from the far end of the hall. The doors of the library had burst open quite suddenly, and a group of miners struggled with something that was clearly alive, dragging it up the stone steps and across the mahogany paneling of the floor; shrieks and eerily human-like wails spouted forth from the throat of the victim; Rose's blue eyes were wide open and shocked when the awful parade at last broke through the crowd and traveled to stand before Galia. Both the mother and the cop let out gasps equal in the amount of surprise or horror; upon the floor lay a bloodied character which Rose recognized, but Cybil did not; a human figure was bound by the same rope that Rose herself had been bound with once before, writhing and struggling against said bonds; a feminine physique was distinguishable through the shimmering crimson that frosted the suggestive clothing and the body within. The face was turned away from Rose and Cybil, and the officer, reverting to her unnatural instincts, cried out above the noise of the crowd and the shrieking of the victim in front of them; no doubt she intended to put an end to whatever sick delusions had the townspeople thinking they had another witch on their hands.

"Cybil, don't--!"

The officer strode forward and into the mass, ignoring Rose's voice, attempting desperately to reach the figure on the ground; she held her gun high above her head, aiming it at the ceiling and threatening to pull the trigger should anyone try to stop her; she at last reached the person, still battling with the evident strength of the thick-braided rope; she made to reach out with her sore arm and snatch the victim away. The motion of her arm ceased and reverberated back in towards her chest when the face of the victim rounded on her; 'twas not a person at all—human, in part, but not in whole; the officer stumbled backward and away in a daze as a partially visible eye composed of rotten tissue met her own; the remainder of the face was swollen and cancerous, and tiny pores could be seen to rhythmically open and seal once more—poor excuses for nostrils. The hat which had previously covered the top of the head fell to the floor, revealing a gaping hole in the disfigured skull through which prolapsed something of a tumor-caked brain. The eye, unblinking, was locked onto those of Cybil, and as she continued to back away, the incubus resumed its agonized thrashing against the ropes.

Someone tugged the officer gently away from the scene; the congregation returned to their business and the miners dragged the entity to lie at Galia's feet; Rose stood transfixed by the goings-on, a part of her curious as to what the woman in the white dress would do, and another part of her wishing she could see no more of it. Cybil had been pushed back to her previous position by the same man whom had gone about drawing the curtains closed; the rubber platforms of her boots seemed bolted in place as she stared out at nothing in particular, likely doing her best to remove the horrid image of the demon nurse from her mind. Voices rang out in a sort of dark harmony in response to whatever Galia was feeding through her own; the creature's struggles weakened within moments and then died altogether; its tiny nares opened and closed as it was slowly starved of the life-giving element by way of some unseen force. Life remained present within it as 'twas dragged by Layton toward the monstrous grated fireplace, whose grate was lowered into the floor.


	14. Playing the Undergod

**A/N: **It's 4:10 am and I suddenly had muse. As always, reviews are appreciated, and as this is a slight turning point, they would be especially liked.

**Chapter Fourteen**

The creaking of the ancient metal being shifted from a pose it had likely remained in for years beforehand was nearly deafening to the two women who watched the goings-on apprehensively; the congregation, however, seemed ultimately unfazed by the sounds; perhaps the metal cage had been moved more often than the women had thought. Whatever the intent of this gathering, whatever method of defense they had devised in order to conquer the darkness that encompassed the building, it was presumably a regular occurrence; crimson and scarlet stained the floor in streaks after the grate had completely vanished and the demon nurse had been lugged to a distance of not three feet from the fire pit itself, which had burst into flame the instant the top of the grate had disappeared into the slot and slid beneath the floor.

The sudden flash of light seemed to awaken the creature a second time, and it put up an even greater fight this time; the binds on its legs, being close to the flame, singed away and snapped under the force of both the demon's flailing and the heat of the fire; its legs now free, it made a valiant effort to stand, but crumpled to the ground when Layton cracked it over the head with an iron rod. Cybil stood stock still at that particular moment, her mind dashing back to the point in their previous journey where she had been the victim bearing those very same blows to the head; Rose was frozen in place for another reason altogether. The inherent human likeness it bore disturbed the young mother to the breaking point; she turned her head away from the scene and fiercely refused to look back again, even when the tormented bellowing of a nearly human form being scorched alive reached her ears. One might have predicted she would cover and protect her ears, deflecting the sounds with the backs of her hands, but she did nothing of the sort, and instead simply crouched down on her toes and wrapped her arms around her legs, trying her best to ignore the sounds.

Galia's voice rose above the screams as they died away, and life left the demon; her eyes fell to Cybil's, and then dropped to Rose's figure, still crouched below eye level. The cop watched the woman in the white dress warily, uncertain what to expect from her as far as intention went. The passel of faces regarded their named dignitary with an admiration in their otherwise stale and torpid eyes—or perhaps 'twas a fear withheld there; Cybil couldn't discern what 'twas for sure. Galia's first words had been lost to her in her examination of the gathering's general outward demeanor; now as the woman continued enunciating the meaning behind the actions of Layton—that is, the placing of the nurse near enough to the fire so as to be burned—, the officer's gaze was cast in the direction of the only sound emanating through the gallery.

"A sacrifice has been made," Galia continued, gesturing toward the corpse that lay only partially roasted due to the position in which it lay, one side near enough to the flame to be singed almost in its entirety and virtually disintegrated by the intense temperature, and the other remaining ultimately unscathed; her tone was oddly steady and emotionless, as if she had given the sermon—if it might have been named such—in the past. Quite suddenly Cybil found her eyes having been locked onto like a torpedo to its target; Galia spoke now as if the officer was the only significant other present in the room. "We do not fight the devil within these walls," she said. "We do not tempt the devil within these walls. No. Here, we play the devil; we attempt to deceive the devil and to outdo Him in a game which He has created; we offer a sacrifice whose origins are linked to those of He himself. This sacrifice will remind the devil of just who it is He toys with."

From her place on the ground, Rose made to get to her feet, having heard the words of the woman preacher as they had been administered and fed to the starving people before her. The mother watched as the congregation seemed to swell and empower themselves upon the mere detection of her vocals; it was admirable, amongst other things. Frightening, yes, it was, in a way, but the hope and pride evident on the townsfolk's expressions were enough to prevent the fright which would ordinarily have accompanied such sights. Sensing eyes upon her off-turned form, Rose's eyes met Cybil's, whose face wore a look of concern; whether or not that concern was aimed at Rose herself, or the situation they were in as a whole, was indistinguishable given the circumstances. The cop said nothing, her own violet irises returning to view the white-cloaked figure as it moved forward to place a gentle palm upon the head of a woman in the front row of the group; the woman's eyes rose to look up at Galia with what might have been deemed curiosity; a moment of silence and then the woman preached spoke again.

"Sonya has felt the presence of another entity amongst us," she said, her eyes narrowing suspiciously and glancing around. They settled briefly on Rose, and Cybil caught the motion, moving instinctively closer to the woman's side and deliberately making the pistol in her hand visible to the leader-lady. Still, it did not discourage her from stepping down from the slightly elevated platform on which she had stood, and walking through the crowd of her followers whom parted the way for her like Red Sea, to stand before Rose, who stared the taller woman in the eye long and hard and questioning. The silence was so thick it could probably have been seen, had anyone been willing to risk a moment to look elsewhere than the mother to whom Galia stood before. "Ah…this one is only _half_ demon."

The appearance of Rose's face at that moment could likely be attributed to the shock of hearing herself being referred to as a demon—even if she was apparently only half of one; a sudden burst of light flittered through the windows of the library, and cast rust colored shadows upon the mahogany flooring, courtesy of the dirtied curtains; Cybil's eyes snapped in the direction of the window nearest to she and Rose, understanding the meaning of said light; the darkness had passed once again, and the corpse before the hearth turned to ash, rising into the air in great flakes, and dissolved into tiny particles of the dust and soot those in the room had by this time grown far too used to accepting as breathable air. Rose abruptly dropped to the floor again to place her palms against the floor; nothing happened, and she only succeeded in receiving a series of incredibly strange looks from almost everyone in the room, save for Galia and her bodyguards.

Slipping the pistol back into the holster, Cybil stepped over to reach down with her good arm and pull Rose back to her feet; Galia backed away the moment she did so, eyeing the cop carefully, as if she were afraid she might decide to bury a bullet in her skull, and, seeing as it _was_ Cybil, such an event wasn't entirely out of the question. The woman in the white dress allowed a smile to spread across her features, the emotions behind it unclear; she lay a hand on the mother's shoulder, who flinched at the gesture but did not pull away; an instant later and she had spoken in tones which suggested none but Rose were supposed to hear, but alas, Cybil was close enough to eavesdrop.

"Use caution, my friend. Should the devil decide to manifest himself within you…a whole demon you will have become, as was the sacrifice."

This being said and heard in addition, Rose tore herself away from the hand upon her collar as Cybil drew her gun for what by now seemed the thousandth time. She aimed it at Galia, her eyes narrowed and the voice which left her throat cold.

"Threaten her again, and we'll see who gets sacrificed."

The dignitary held her hands in the air and backed off again, at last turning to follow the procession of those who had been present in the gathering as they filed out of the library. Layton and the other miner stared after the mother and the cop before returning to flank their leader. Rose's mind had already left the present situation far behind; her thoughts now consisted only of the syringe and the number on the paper she had come across. The possibilities of her findings' significances were innumerable; whilst her first impressions had been that the number on the paper was a call number for a particular book in the library whence it had been discovered, there didn't appear to be anything more of the text; only the numbers were present. Her sea-eyes blankly scanned the room until they landed upon the stains of blood that trailed across the floor panels like the angry brushstrokes of a disturbed artist. Suspicion came to her at once, and she mumbled slightly louder than she'd anticipated. "…It's an address."

Cybil rounded on her, curiosity and concern peaking in the same moment; she winced as the wound on her shoulder stretched and popped with the movement, sending a stinging sensation through her upper torso. Violet eyes rested on Rose's face, searching unceasingly for context to go with her nearly silent statement. "What?"

Apparently having no idea she'd spoken the words aloud, the young mother looked up at the cop, her eyebrows raised in surprise and her lips parted slightly. The ruffled blonde hair leaked into her eyes, seeming to melt into the dirtied cream color of her skin, and with a single motion she brushed it away, leaving a streak of cleanliness that made Cybil smile faintly in spite of herself. Her hand reached into her pocket to remove the paper from within it; unfolding it, she opened the thin sheet to reveal the numbers, studying them for a longer moment than her eyes preferred; they watered from lack of protection from the lids; she blinked rapidly an instant later, restoring vital moisture, and pivoted on her heel to stride from the building. Cybil followed suit, having to jog a few paces to keep up with the other woman's sweeping strides; she decided not to press the matter as to just where she was being led to—Rose wouldn't answer her anyway, for once she entered the realm of her mind, 'twas no simple task to remove her from it. A part of her was on edge from the indirect threat made by Galia toward Rose; she was wary of encountering the townsfolk whom likely lay beyond the doors through which Rose was now progressing. Once outside however, she was dumbstruck to see that there lay not a soul in their sight; in fact, there were no outward signs of anyone ever having laid foot on the ash-covered streets outside.

"It's an address."

Rose had repeated her earlier declaration on a slightly delayed timescale, and stopped in her place as she did so, turning to survey Cybil, as if she had forgotten something, and then suddenly remembered in the same instant in time. "How's your shoulder?"

"Not as well as I'd like it to be," the cop answered testily, frowning and changing the subject quickly. "Where the Hell is this address you're talking about? We might as well go find it, right?"

The mother's surprise was evident by the expression on her face; clearly she had not expected her friend to react with such obvious hostility to a question behind which had been only the most genuine of intentions, but she more or less brushed it off as a character trait—presumably Cybil Bennett didn't appreciate feeling weak or pitied. The cop too, noticed the almost hurt appearance of her friend, and as Rose's voice broke through the awkward silence, regret etched itself in the lines of her face.

"Yeah."

The mother's footsteps soon pervaded through the foggy atmosphere, echoing off the buildings and ancient, rusted vehicles which still lined the streets after years of abandon; as if on cue, Rose halted and then scurried up to an old pick-up truck, pulling open the passenger side door and climbing partially inside. Cybil's eyes narrowed with a sense of inquisitiveness as she stood guard; upon questioning her, the response received was something along the lines of a clanking sound and a screech, followed by a great blur of outrageously fast movement; Rose's figure scrambled out of the car like a coon caught under a coon-dog's gaze and nearly knocked Cybil full to the ground as she attempted to seize and stop her from injuring any other body parts via the hard concrete sidewalk. The impromptu motion of her arm did not pain her shoulder as much as she'd thought it would, and as she aided a visibly trembling Rose in gathering her feet beneath her, one might even go so far as to describe the pain as almost entirely absent. Almost, but nowhere near completely.

The mother remained in her place for a long moment, somewhat enjoying the comfort offered by the impossibly strong grip Cybil had situated upon the area of her arms just above her elbows, and allowing herself time to regain the oxygen which had been lost to fear. Thoughtlessness ensued, and a moment later Rose had turned and crushed her quivering lips against those of the cop, who in turn proceeded to go into a brief state of paralysis—likely due to shock—and offered a slight return of the gesture, only to wrench herself away an instant past; unintentionally she had shoved Rose with harrowing force backwards and into the side of the car in her hurry to detach herself. The mother's cerulean eyes were wide with derogation and ignominy, humiliation and utter incredulity thrown in with the mix as well, and for an agonizingly long few seconds the two simply stared one another down, each asking the other for an explanation neither of them possessed.

"Rose—What the—You—We can't possibly—"

Cybil's features were hard with confusion and distress, and Rose immediately realized the severity of the act she had just, albeit unthinkingly, committed. Unable to keep her eyes on her friend for any longer, her gaze and her body crumpled to the ground, her legs suddenly unable to support her weight; palms were pressed against her face as hot tears of indescribable emotion followed familiar trails down her face and splashed onto the ground with an almost rhythmic beat; the cop watched with a sense of introspection before overcoming the awkwardness of the past minutes to drop to the balls of her feet and with both hands tilt Rose's face to be level with her own, at last securing the worried thoughts pulsing through both their minds in place by way of a second, more prolonged caress.


	15. Autophobia

**A/N: **Another chapter for y'all. Reviews would be greatly appreciated, as I'm slowing down a bit and could use ideas/encouragement. Thanks a million times over to those loyal readers and reviewers though!

**

* * *

Chapter Fifteen**

The two were still undergoing equal numbers of electric shocks to the mind by the time the cop finally pulled away from the gesture; she helped Rose to her feet in silence, and for what seemed an eternity, they walked in silence. The mother continued leading the way, glancing down at the paper that she still clutched tightly with one hand as she walked; Cybil's footsteps echoed behind, and she kept gladly kept her distance, though she was sure not to allow herself to stray too far from the woman, lest something happen and she needed assistance of any kind. Periodically she would stop and search one of the vehicles parked on the side of the street as she had done before, and each time she would emerge from them with a frustrated expression on her face. She didn't need to explain to the cop that she was trying to find one that might actually run, seeing as her only means of transportation had been totaled and sent over a bridge.

The cap of the syringe pressed into Rose's thigh through the thin material of her pocket as she walked; a building was passed as she attempted to remove the item from said pocket; once she had done so she looked up suddenly and halted so quickly as to cause Cybil to nearly collide with her. She spun around as Cybil moved to the side, and hurried up to the entrance of the building passed by. With hands that still quaked from the two's previous encounter, Rose held the paper up to her eyes and double checked the number—or the part of the number that was readable.

"I think this is it."

The cop said nothing when Rose's eyes surveyed her briefly, but only followed as the woman pulled open one of the heavy doors and squeezed through the narrow opening she had achieved; the room beyond the doors was laden with the same familiar ash as was the rest of that Hellish place, though 'twas slightly thicker in the air itself, and the mother choked somewhat as she tried to catch the breath that had been lost in the exertion of trying to open the doors. Having been discovered in the same drawer of the desk that the address had originated in, the presence of the syringe made sense now; the building they had entered was apparently a psychiatric facility. It was unnerving to have entered such a place; the only comfort to the mother came from the knowledge of the police officer's presence nearby, and though she turned to look pointedly at the holster of the pistol—which was emptied upon Cybil's understanding of the silent suggestion—Rose was quiet, somewhat afraid to speak in this place. Predatory _lusus naturae_ were one thing; mentally disturbed predatory ones were another matter entirely, and something neither woman wished to encounter.

Steeling her nerves, Rose gripped the syringe—which she now saw to be filled with some sort of scarlet liquid; not blood, but some sort of chemical—and the paper with the address was crumpled tightly in the other hand as she ascended a staircase. Before she was three steps up, however, the feel of leather upon her bare shoulder stopped her movements gently, but forcefully. Blue met violet, and the cop's voice was issued forth in the soft but authoritative tones so typically used. It was not stated as a question would have been, but rather as a declaration.

"Maybe I should go first."

The mother nodded, allowing her friend to pass by her and climb the winding staircase gradually, taking her time, lest any canines happen to come bounding out from any nearby rooms, or any wobbling, crook-legged armless beings feel the urge to take her head off via their own acidic venom. They reached the second floor in due time, the cop swinging around the corner quickly after only a moment's preparation, her gun poised to shoot; the corridor was empty, and she relaxed slightly, dropping the pistol to her waist but retaining her hold on it with both hands. The leather of the gloves creaked slightly as she did so, and she glimpsed Rose behind her to ensure she was still present. The awkwardness of the past events had softened now that they were back to work; problems were forgotten and romance took the back seat. Yet the young blonde nearly choked herself with such thoughts; there _was_ no romance here. Rose was her friend and nothing more. She'd only been carried away in her moment of fright. But then…what exactly had led her to believe that returning the gesture was the best option?

"Cybil?"

Shaking her head and removing herself from the realm of thought into which she had fallen, the officer stepped aside so as to let Rose walk alongside her, the pistol still ready for action should its services be needed. They'd been fortunate so far; they'd not been forced to fire more than a few shots just yet, and Cybil would have liked it to stay as such. Though most of the beings roaming the town seemed to come about only during the darkness, those who had shown themselves at random held themselves in a position worthy of the women's concern and apprehension. Soot coated doors lined the passageway, some cracked open to reveal hospital beds and iron clamps which had likely been used to hold patients in place; leather straps hung over and extended onto the floor so as to seemingly slither at the two like some sort of exceptionally threatening serpent; Rose moved to walk directly in the center of the hall, likely to distance herself equally from the rooms on either side of both she and Cybil, who seemed remarkably unfazed.

The procession down the chalky corridor was suddenly impeded by the site of an elevator marking the end of the hall, which they had been unable to see previously due to the thick dust and fog and ash present in the air; there were no apparent alternative routes; stairs were not present, and Cybil followed the entire wall with her hand just to be certain there were no doors hiding from view. She found nothing, and with a frustrated expelling of breath, turned to look at Rose with a gaze reading something along the lines of, '_Now what, oh brilliant leader?'_ The mother stared at the closed doors of the elevator for what felt an eternity, before sensing the cop's eyes upon her, and casting her a glare of whose sharpness was probably undeserved, even given the annoyed expression that had evoked it.

"You know, the last elevator I went in _did_ work."

"I vote we take the stairs."

"There are no stairs."

"How do you know? We haven't even looked at the other end yet."

"Institutions of this time all had exterior stairwells. Used to think it prevented breakouts, I guess. And besides, don't you think there'd be signs if there were any in here?"

The cop didn't reply, but simply stared at the dirtied tile floor, slightly surprised that Rose would have known anything about history. 'Twas rude to prejudge, but Cybil had been under the impression that the young mother wasn't very…intelligent—at least not as far as architecture went. It would seem now that she was incorrect in her opinions of the woman, and she reminded herself that it was not the first time she had been wrong about Rose Da Silva; their first meeting had led the officer to believe she was a disturbed child abductor. She should have known by now not to underestimate her friend. Alas, she seemed predestined to be predisposed in any opinions and assumptions she had or made; nothing could be done to prevent them. She would simply have to correct herself instead.

Rose stepped closer to the elevator and tried her best to pry it open with her fingertips, but to no avail; it was simply too tightly clamped shut to give in to her limited strength. Cybil watched her try several other methods of opening it, including uncapping the syringe and squirting a very small amount of the crimson chemical within onto the door; it sizzled for a moment, but did not appear to have weakened any. Under ordinary circumstances, the cop would have laughed at the mother's attempts, but unfortunately they were in Silent Hill and she was unable to, for it almost made sense that the syringe would have proved useful in _this_ alternate reality. Sighing, and against her better judgment, Cybil walked forward and gestured to Rose to move aside; she did so without question; the officer removed a collapsible baton from her utility belt, extending it to its full length and with a quick thrust, pierced it through the burned area of the door. The hole left behind provided a point of leverage; she made to reach out and grip it with her hand after removing the baton, but Rose grabbed her wrist before she could do so, tearing it away with a force Rose hadn't even known she'd been capable of producing.

"Don't touch it!" she cried, releasing Cybil's wrist after it was a safe distance from the door. "You saw what it did there—not too intelligent of a move to try and touch the very same place where it started to eat away the metal."

More annoyed with herself than with Rose, the officer jabbed the baton back through the hole and tried to force the doors open; the mother pulled in the opposite direction on the unmarked door, seeing as the injury to Cybil's shoulder prevented her from using her other arm much. At last the doors slid open, and Rose quickly placed a stray piece of sturdy wall-stone between them to keep them from springing shut a second time. The two stepped back to admire their work, of sorts, although Cybil did not look at all pleased with the fact that the young mother was far too adamant about using the ancient elevator. She watched as Rose moved to squeeze herself through the small space provided to her; it was lucky for them both that they were as slim as they were; Cybil moved in after her, doing her best to overcome her fear of a malfunction.

The stone holding the doors open suddenly crumbled into tiny particles, sending the doors into a sort of rebound from the tension having been had on them previously only just after Cybil had fully entered the car; the loud crack which resounded through the small space of the elevator reached their ears by way of a rolling and twisting and snapping motion, and all too quickly; Rose's neck lurched backwards, bashing into the wall behind with dizzying force. Cybil managed to maintain her balance as the mechanism pitched into a freefall which sent them nearly sprawling against the ceiling above; a moment's time past and it clattered to a halt with a deafening and teeth-grinding screech. The only sounds following which could be heard were the off-pace gasps of the two women present within the close and suffocating confines of the archaic contraption of steel chords and iron frame; 'smothering' wasn't the proper word to be used in this case—'twas much worse than that. At last recovering, Cybil peered through the hole in the door made by the baton, and drew back an instant later; they had not yet reached the level at which a door was to be opened so as to free them.

Claustrophobia swiftly washed over her, though she did her best not to allow it to overcome her; she'd been in tight spaces before, and unlike most, this one was larger and had a means of easy escape. Violet eyes sprang upward to the ceiling of the car; Rose was still doing her best to breathe as the cop pushed a rust-melded grate up and out of the way with extreme difficulty, though she nonetheless succeeded. The terrible sight and smell of the elevator shaft greeted her and she nearly vomited at the image; various organs were caught between the chords and indentations in the walls of the shaft, and though most did not appear human, their unexpected appearances laid on the disgust plenty thick. The majority oozed pus-like substances of blue and purple and black; those not doing so simple steamed and convulsed as if they were still alive. The tongue of a canine crashed through the grate quite suddenly, thrashing about desperately, and causing Rose to shriek and jump into a standing position with her back pressed into the corner of the elevator. Cybil raised one leg quickly and pinned the detached limb under the space of her boot left between the heel and the sole; she didn't anticipate that the organ would whip itself around and attempt to slash her across the leg, but by some twist of sheer luck, she dodged it. As if the motion had been done on dying breath, the limb thumped lifelessly to the floor, and lay still.

"I swear, the next one of these things that comes within fifty feet of me is getting strangled by its God forsaken tongue."

Rose, quivering, raised her ocean eyes to stare at her friend blankly for a long moment, before she forthwith collapsed, a dead weight against the bottom of the elevator, and it let loose at the sudden pressure; with a clank it fell the rest of the way until landed with a dull thud against what Cybil presumed to be the bottom most level of the building. Her immediate attention once she was on her feet again was shifted to Rose, who still lay motionless on the floor; the cop knew she wouldn't be able to get out of the elevator without Rose's assistance, and with a shaky voice, she dropped to her knees beside her friend and shook her roughly with the hand of her good arm. Rose's form did nothing, only rested with her face down in her arms and was silent; not even the rhythmic sound of her breathing reached Cybil's ears, and with this realization, she nearly panicked.

"Rose! What the hell! Goddammit, _wake up!_"

The cop rolled the woman over so that she was face-up, and felt for a pulse, which she was glad to soon find, but she knew it wouldn't be there much longer unless she got the mother breathing again, and _very_ soon. It had been so long since her training, she'd virtually forgotten anything and everything about CPR; nevertheless, she dropped her gun and baton and endured the pain of moving both arms to quickly and repetitively press down on her friend's chest cavity, attempting first to revive her by way of such actions only. It paid off. When the first bit of oxygen flooded the mother's lungs, the color in her face immediately returned, and a surge of relief very near overpowered Cybil to the point of blacking out herself. She crumpled into a sitting position, her legs folded partially and off to one side so that she was tilted slightly; the cop pulled her friend's lightweight frame closer so as to rest her head in her lap and move the hair from the woman's eyes as she threw her head from side to side for a few moments. Once she had finally settled, and her senses returned, Rose bent her neck back so as to look up at Cybil, still shaken.

"For God's sake Rose," the cop breathed, subconsciously stroking the tangled hair in anxiety. "Don't ever do that to me again. I thought I'd lost you."

The hidden side of Cybil Bennett had shown itself once more; she was no longer the stark deputy here, bust was instead a human being capable of compassion, hurt, and concern, and above all, fear. It was a strange sort of relief to Rose, as she lay for the most part unmoving, her breathing and mind steadily clearing; the combination of the rhythmic sifting of her once silken hair by gloved hands, and the surprising warmth and softness of the leather holster of the pistol which pressed against the back of her neck were soothing; for a moment, her troubles were forgotten, and existence was composed only of she and Cybil. The officer had been invaluable to her during her time here in the Hellish Silent Hill, both emotionally and otherwise; she realized upon awakening that if Cybil Bennett hadn't been present there in the elevator with her, she wouldn't have had the privilege of awakening as she had done. Yet again the cop had played the heroine, and although Rose was by this point growing quite sick of feeling insignificant, weak and absent minded, she would be forever grateful for the time she was able to spend with this woman. The thoughts parading about her mind were unashamed; she'd kissed this woman, she recalled, and she'd had reason behind it; even if she wasn't yet certain just what that reasoning was, she knew it existed, and she knew that it continued to the very moment in which she herself was existing.

She was married, with a child, albeit adopted; there were plenty of logical arguments against why she shouldn't harbor the feelings for the cop she was currently harboring. She doubted it was anything different than what she had once felt for her husband before she had accepted that she was never going to return to him unless she faced Silent Hill again, and even then, their future together was uncertain. Cybil, however…Cybil was there with her, fighting alongside her, helping her and protecting her; it was to be expected that she feel more of a connection with one who had practically given her life in the hopes that Rose's might have been spared a torturous fate of blackened, blistering flesh. Perhaps it was truly only a deep friendship which drew the young mother to the equally young deputy; there was a serious doubt residing in the very depths of her mind, however; this was something much more than just friendship. But was it love? She'd grown to understand the necessities associated with actual _love_, but none of them seemed to suit the situation into which she and Cybil had befallen. Their relationship was something that refused to be put into words, that refused to be labeled or categorized, and one that ultimately refused to give in to pressure and allow some sort of consummation or acknowledgement of fact to occur, or to break itself into irreparable shards of broken hope. Whatever it was, it frustrated the mother as she lay there, all too comfortable in the position in which she was currently placed, but she managed to speak a few words which she hoped would be of comfort to the officer.

"I suppose I should have told you I have a few anxiety disorders, huh?"


	16. Diablo's Infrastructure

**Chapter Sixteen**

The racket of the double doors of the elevator and shaft being forced apart clanked and scraped about the dark room to which they opened; within moments the forms of two women could be seen to be exiting the elevator, and a flashlight suddenly beamed through the inky atmosphere, revealing to them both that they were being welcomed into an incredibly large basement. From some far off place a boiler hissed and rattled, a disturbing subject should one choose to truly think on it, considering the residents of Silent Hill would have no reason to keep such a machine in operation; the syringe, which had been placed once again in Rose's pocket, pressed against her thigh as they made their way cautiously forward, the mother sticking close by to the cop, if only for the light she possessed. Cybil was still shaken from the moments back in the elevator; if Rose hadn't made it, she quite believed she would have either gone insane, or killed herself, for there seemed no other option should she ever be faced with Silent Hill alone. She'd become completely codependent, or so it seemed, unable to survive on her own in such a horrid place. Rose was her only support, and despite the trouble she was notorious for both getting herself into, and causing in the first place, Cybil Bennett was plenty attached to her.

Something particularly large and cold and wet befell the back of Rose's neck, trailing down her back and making her jump; forward movement ceased and ocean eyes shot upward to stare at the floor above; 'twas only condensation, she reassured herself; Cybil's flashlight beam came to rest just below Rose's face, for she knew better than to shine such a bright ray in someone's eyes. Her gaze was quizzical as she watched the woman reach over her own shoulder and attempt to remove the droplet from her skin; upon passing her hand through the area of light, Cybil's eyes widened and she grabbed her wrist, shining the flashlight on her friend's fingertips. What had been thought mere condensation was nothing of the sort; the substance was far too thick to have been such. With a barely audible gasp, the officer jerked the remaining sleeve of Rose's shirt down low enough so as to remove the tar-like mess from her fingers, silently thanking whatever bit of God remained in this place for allowing that sleeve to be long enough to do so; Rose seemed to have caught on to what had befallen her, and she proceeded to nearly panic, knowing that the acidic entity still remained slipping between her shoulder blades. The cop had no need to voice any command; Rose had already turned her back and removed her shirt in an obvious frenzy.

Cybil snatched the fabric before it could hit the ground and become more contaminated than it was already, and with only slight impairment via her injured shoulder, she used the same sleeve as previously to quickly wipe away the acid, which had already begun to eat away at the pallid flesh of the woman's spine, judging by both appearance and the hiss of pain at the stinging sensation. The flashlight remained trained upon Rose's back as the cop removed the last of the acid, and shook her head at the realization that there would almost assuredly be scars left behind; when she had finished she aimed the ray of the light upward at the source of the substance, and was shocked to see much of the same black, tar-like essence preparing to fall upon her own frame; with a hurried motion she shoved Rose and herself out of range of the entity, only to feel the ground beneath her almost instantaneously disappear.

The flashlight clattered to the stone floor and the pistol as well, having fallen from its holster as thin wires suddenly snapped around the cop's slim form, the presence of barbs amongst the metal becoming known once they had immersed themselves through her shirt and into her flesh; she had been raised above the ground and light though she was, her own weight turned against her in this case, forcing the barbs deeper as they tried to maintain a hold on her. At last a strand wound itself about her ankles, which offered some small semblance of support, and eased the pain to a small extent; in the meantime Rose had torn the soiled sleeve off her shirt and thrown the remainder over her head as she expelled Cybil's name through her lips. She snared the flashlight in her hands and shined it upward, following the writhing movements of the wires and tracing them back to the source; a great hole was present in the earth, and the form of a creature of indescribable magnitude clung within it, tentacles of both a plant-like matter and of barbed iron supporting its bulk. Rose was awestruck, dumbfounded, paralyzed and unable to move or think; Cybil still struggled against the relentless strength of the wires binding her and holding her a dangerous level off the floor. Abruptly coming back to her senses, the mother's cerulean gaze hurdled onto the gun, which she immediately dashed toward and snatched; the barrel was aimed at what she presumed to be the head of the being, but one of the wires ripped it away from her before she could fire, holding it far beyond her reach.

A scented mist spewed forth as the monstrosity opened what appeared to be a mouth, showering the two with something they would rather not have known the makeup of, and instantaneously following, the pain in Rose's knee, and wrist, and back and elsewhere vanished. The bandage on her wrist shriveled and disintegrated, revealing naught but a small scar; the cuts and scrapes littering the rest of her body were treated in an equal manner, and her lungs felt suddenly purified, as if the mist had brought with it a wave of blesséd oxygen alone. To her right, Cybil's movements ceased, and she was gripped with the fear that whatever this giant was had succeeded in killing her friend, but not a moment later and she had been placed not especially gently upon her feet, decidedly as shocked as Rose herself was; the injury to her shoulder had gone, as had the others; the pistol was lightly returned to the holster by a lone tentacle, and the flashlight offered to her palm.

"Perhaps now you will think before you shoot blindly into the face of an ally."

The voice which emanated from the depths of the being's throat was so deep and booming that the gust of the breath pushed both women backwards several steps; the voice echoed throughout the basement, projecting it even further. The two were silent with uncertainty; 'twas not an every day occurrence to have such an alien-like life form speak to them after having just apparently removed them of their wounds. Cybil was the first to recover, having felt the material of her uniform to realize that it too had been mended with the touch of mist; she shined the flashlight on the creature so as to see it more clearly, as the light from the inferno below did nothing in the way of comfortable vision; her own vocals, tiny and insignificant in comparison to the beast's, became heard.

"Forgive me," she began cautiously, her normally steady, authoritative tones quaking now, likely in concern. "But I don't believe acting in such a way as you have was the best manner in which to show yourself an ally."

"Unfortunately I was not able to do you any good without having better seen your injuries," the creature said calmly, as if all would be explained with that simple answer.

"So you nearly kill me instead?"

"Cybil!" interjected Rose worriedly.

"That's just the way things are here, and if you don't like it, I can always reverse the deal," it retorted, whacking the tip of one wire tentacle upon the stone floor just a few inches from her feet, no doubt a threatening gesture. Flinching, Cybil fell silent, and Rose took the opportunity to attempt to make amends with the being.

" You…said you were an ally…" the young mother pried softly from her place, and looked up at it. "Besides the obvious," she stated, gesturing to her wrist, "what exactly do you mean by those words?"

The steady sound of the personage's breathing was the only sound present in the room for a long moment, its cold breath softening so as to be sure not to send the women sprawling to the floor, until at last, the plant-like cranium raised itself slightly, and it spoke yet again.

"You have seen that your entrance into the church was only partially successful," said the monstrosity, swinging the end of one wire absentmindedly, and stretching the enormous head toward Rose. In the light of Cybil's flashlight, no eyes were visible on the appendage, which was unnerving to the young mother, to say the least; however, it must have been able to see, as it had spoken earlier of a need to view the cop's injuries before it could mend them.

"Are you implying that there is something left unfinished?" Rose inquired quickly, her expression betraying the hardened fear she was currently harboring. "I did everything that was asked of me."

"Alas, you were not asked to complete the all of the proper tasks. Have you not wondered why it is you are still drawn to this place against your will? Have you not bothered to let curiosity win over you, and lead you to the source of your continued presence here?"

"Of course I have," Rose snapped testily, and then toned down her words. "Why do you think I'm here now?"

The being pulled the head away from her now, and one of the vines slithered forward and placed itself beneath her chin, lifting her face momentarily, and then dropping away to disappear into the red-hot pit from whence it had come; Cybil watched warily from her place beside Rose, her hand resting readily upon the pistol, though it remained in the holster. The voice, slightly louder and more insistent this time around, filtered through the dank air once more.

"You are here now to find a cure for your daughter's ailment."

"How encouraging," Cybil muttered to herself, rolling her eyes. "It talks, _and_ it states the obvious."

"I'd hold your tongue if I were you, lady deputy," the beast snapped, jabbing a vine against her upper arm so as to get the point across. "I am the authority in this world…_not_ you. Do not tempt me." It now turned its attention to Rose, continuing its speech. "Now, I believe you will recall a woman by the name of Dahlia Gillespie."

Rose's eyes shifted from where they had rested worriedly upon Cybil's form, to the putrid-looking creature before them. "Yes," she said firmly, staring at the being with narrowed eyes.

"Perhaps you will also recall her role in the creation of this Hell?"

"She was an unsuspecting mother who'd been brainwashed by the words of that religious fanatic Christabella."

Barbed wire slashed at her skin as it wrapped around her body and lifted her into the air, much as had been done with Cybil, though with sufficient support so as to prevent serious injury. The cop's voice could be heard shouting in protest to the action and the pistol was freed of its imprisonment within the holster; another strand of wire made quick work of snatching the weapon and removing the bullets, projecting them downward into the inferno beneath the stone floor, and tossing the empty shell of a gun back to the frustrated deputy. She struck out with her flashlight at one of the twisting vines and so connected hard metal with soft, spongy matter; the great head shook resignedly, before a particularly large vine-like tendril complete with enormous thorns forced and pinned the woman to the ground; one of the thorns pierced straight through the shin of her right leg, passing between the two bones present, driving into the stone beneath, and resulting in such an outcry of anguish from the downed officer, that it pained Rose more to hear it than it probably did Cybil to feel it.

"She was not unsuspecting!" the beast bellowed, causing pieces of the floor above to crumble and fall to the stone below, while ignoring the groaning of the wounded cop; the barbed wire tightened considerably around Rose's waist; she sucked in the still purified air with cautious motion, unwilling to allow her midsection to expand enough to place it in danger of being sliced open by the barbs any more so than it already had been. "She conceived that child by way of sin! Alessa does not understand the complications of allowing her mother to survive whilst slaughtering all the others! The child is innocent, born of the sins of another; completely beyond her control such events were, though now that they are no longer, she does not understand. She does not understand, and she does not wish to believe."

Rose's eyes were wide with both fright and confusion as the monstrosity boomed onward with its speech and its explanations; she said nothing, only tried to tune out the sounds of her friend who still lay bleeding on the floor, trying to allow the lord to speak and finish before the blood loss became fatally low.

"Dahlia Gillespie is the source of this Hell. The darkness of Alessa is just as innocent as the goodness of Alessa. Your daughter. She is the innocent, and you, her mother, have sinned as much so as hath Dahlia. For your friend's and your daughter's return to the world from whence you have come, one sinner…one mother…must perish."


	17. A New Task

**A/N: **OMG IT UPLOADED!!! D

**

* * *

**

**Chapter Seventeen**

Rose Da Silva did her best not to allow the devil's words to launch her into panic mode; her eyes focused on Cybil as she steadily wavered in her partially upright position, weakening with the continuous outward flow of blood. The young mother wriggled against the bonds of the wires, trying ever so subtly to convince the beast to free her so that she could reach her friend, and ignoring the flashes of pain which sliced through her as the barbs embedded themselves within her skin. At last, the monster seemed to have gathered her intentions, and it lowered her a foot or so above the ground and dropped her onto her feet, in the process ripping the enormous thorn from Cybil's shin and causing her to let out another cry, and topple over to one side, undeniably weak and anguished; vomit rose in her throat but she forced it down; blood on the ground was enough.

Rose dropped to her knees beside the cop, gently forcing her hands away from the wound on her leg, her own trembling violently as she did so, likely from fear and concern; her senses heightened when she felt the presence of the lord's head-like appendage near them; the mist was released from its mouth a second time, and the wounds upon both their bodies simultaneously and instantaneously vanished as had occurred earlier. Rose gasped at the sensation of the slashes to her stomach closing; Cybil groaned slightly at a similar, likely more painful sensation of the same kind. Rose moved her into a more upright position without looking at her; her attention was focused now upon the monstrosity which was gradually receding into the inferno beneath. When its form had completely vanished, the two women looked at each other, each silently asking the same question, until Rose at last spoke it aloud.

"What the Hell just happened?"

Cybil seemed so ultimately shocked by the past occurrences that she was thereby rendered incapable of answering—or incapable of understanding her friend's words; Rose wasn't sure which was the case. Her violet eyes stared straight into those of Rose, yet they were unseeing, and this disturbed the young mother. She gripped the cop's shoulder and shook her roughly for a moment, and at long last the other woman let out a sharp exhalation which she hadn't known she'd been withholding; swaying to one side as she moved her head in a quick semblance of disbelief, the officer made to get her feet beneath her, and stand. Rose did the same, her gaze steady on her friend in making certain she was all right. The cop's authoritative, yet smoothly feminine voice split the air an instant past.

"Whatever that thing was, I can't say I regret meeting it."

She moved her once injured arm freely, and examined her shin as well. There was a long, oddly shaped scar on both areas of her body, but she could live with them. Besides, scars told stories, and she'd always liked the attention she'd received for those stories. Rose, however, was not nearly so pleased, and examined her bullet-struck wrist; the fingers of her opposite hand probed over it, fretting over the scar, and she mumbled several words and phrases of questionable morality to herself which shall thus remain unrepeated. Quite plainly, she was the more self-conscious of the two.

"Hey—c'mon. We should get going," Cybil said gently from beside the young mother, though she was looking not at her, but at the place where the floor had only moments before been lacking in solidity; where there once had been an enormous pit of fire, there was no naught but stone and earth combined to create the basement's foundation. Rose shot one last disapproving frown in the direction of her wrist, and then looked down at her chest so as to take in the tattered remains of her blouse. When she had finished her visual inspection, though it was difficult in the dim light, she moved forward a step or two, awaiting Cybil and the flashlight. Its beam with fading, and quickly at that; within a few moments the two were engulfed in a raging darkness, which swirled and twisted about them, clutching at their throats with its poisoned air; the toxins burned after the short relief of the mist. Rose coughed once, and Cybil turned her gaze sharply upon her companion, making a motion as if to grip the mother's shoulder, but thinking better of it, the motion died and her arm slumped back to her side, whilst the other held the pistol in its holster.

"We need to get out of here. The air's even worse in this building than it is anywhere else," the cop said grimly, looking around as they made their way cautiously and painstakingly slowly forward, unable to see much without the flashlight, and wary of falling into some unforeseen trap. Rose looked in her general direction, but did not focus on her directly, for she could not see her.

"We _need_ to find Dahlia, is what we need to do," the stricken mother replied stiffly.

"Well sor-_ry_. Excuse me if I wasn't doing enough to help you out."

Ah, so Cybil did indeed have a temper at times.

Rose shook her head, the mass of uncleanly hair atop it swaying back and forth as she did so; the officer stared at what she presumed to be the floor, placing each foot carefully in front of the other, and occasionally reaching an arm out to protest Rose's tendency toward faster movement. It felt good to suddenly be injury-free; she'd taken it for granted before, but never again. Rose felt similarly. Suddenly, Cybil froze in her place and inhaled sharply, causing Rose's heart rate to quicken several speeds and cease forward motion also.

"Did you hear that?" the cop whispered worriedly, and Rose stared at her dark figure blankly, with a frightened expression barely visible on her face. "Let's go."

Breaking into a desperate dead-bolt, fleeing some unseen yet decidedly unfriendly entity, both women raced through the inky bowls of the institution, stumbling slightly in the lack of light; all at once there appeared a slim slit of light amongst the infinite blackness now turned finite; gathering speed, they rushed toward it and crashed through it; sunlight waited on the other side—if it could be called sunlight. The familiar landscape of fog, fallen, and falling ash greeted them, and though the light was welcome, what now lay in their sights was not.

A mechanically marred malformation of a once silver Jeep Liberty rested on all four ravaged and tireless rims before them; the guardrail-punctured windshield seemed to stare unblinkingly at them, the twisted wipers reaching out and beckoning them forward, yet continuously threatening them and warning them not to fall into their clutches; the roof was twisted and bent beyond recognition, and a section had been peeled backward so as to reveal the ruined interior of the vehicle. The passenger side door was missing completely, and the hatchback was raised up on only one hinge while the other hinge, along with half of the hatch itself, was folded back upon itself. Behind it lay the bridge into Silent Hill, complete and connecting; to one side rested the sign with the forever to be flickering yellow light; mother and officer looked at one another with widened and narrowed eyes, both equally as questioning as the last, and neither able to provide the other with an adequate explanation.

Upon returning their shocked gazes back to rest on the form of the destroyed truck, a loud crack was heard just before the front bumper removed itself from the otherwise imprisoning bolts of the decaying vehicle. Both women leapt away from it as it tumbled toward them and then swiftly melted and dissolved into the ashen landscape beneath. Rose's sea eyes now raised to stare inquisitively at the remainder of the truck, and, much to Cybil's disapproval, stepped forward, slowly at first, and then gaining impulsion before she found herself stopped beside the driver's side door. The tattered seats within were empty, or so it appeared; one could never be quite certain in this world, she reasoned as she reached out to touch the twisted and partially melted black latch on the door. Out of nowhere, strong arms wrapped themselves around the mother's surprisingly thin midsection, and she was pulled backward just as the machine burst into a ball of blue and white flame. In an instant it had dematerialized just before their eyes, and Cybil took a moment to understand that she had suddenly found herself with a familiar woman very nearly in her lap, and that she was lacking the sort of discomfort which would otherwise have been present during such a meeting. This in itself was more disconcerting than anything else at that moment.

Rose however, made no move to free the cop from her position, and instead seemed focused on a particular area of the surrounding landscape; a woolen cloak had been carelessly thrown upon the earth and somewhat singed, likely due to the blast of heat having previously emanated from the now vanished Liberty. It was strangely familiar to the young parent, and without a second thought she got to her feet—much to the relief of Cybil—and moved over to examine it, squatting down upon her ankles. As she neared it with her hands, it too burst into flame and she toppled over backward, to which Cybil responded by way of a hurried raising of her position to the elbows, and a titled back head.

"Good Lord Rose!" the cop gasped wearily as she rolled over to stand up, as Rose scurried to her own feet a second time. "Do I honestly have to tell you not to touch everything you see?"

The mother looked at the officer with partially widened eyes, for a moment not really seeing her or understanding the words which had been spoken, as she caught her breath and came to her senses; with a gentle shake of her dirtied blonde locks, her attention focused truly on her friend. "I think that was Dahlia's robe," the mother said calmly, completely ignoring Cybil's question, which ended with a rolling of violet eyes. "Why would she leave it?"

"I'm inclined to believe she had something to do with what just happened here a minute or so ago."

"With the truck?"

"What else?"

"Good point."

"I didn't like the sound of what that thing said back there."

Rose looked at her sharply. "What do you mean?"

"'One mother must perish.' Bullshit if I'm going to let you die here. He might as well just have said 'Dahlia must die.'"

"A little overprotective are we?"

Silence reigned for a brief moment.

"Shut up Rose."

A light, jingling chuckle passed from the young mother's throat, something which Cybil hadn't heard during their time in the Hellish Silent Hill, and she was surprised to find that such a simple sound would enliven her to the point of smiling in return. Happiness wasn't something that was easy to come by in a place such as this; anything even remotely similar to such an idea was welcome to them both, and they took advantage of it for the short instants during which it remained. Rose's sea eyes shifted to stare through the spaces in the chain link fence surrounding numerous rusted vehicles—which bore a striking resemblance to how the Liberty had appeared just moments before—and then spoke.

"Have you ever been up there?" she asked, gestured to the hills upon which the vehicles' skeletal remains rested. "I've never been up there."

Cybil followed her gaze worriedly upward, her short-lived smile fading, and a barely audible groan of disapproval escaped her against her will. Rose's perseverance was marked by a deep intrepidity and fortitude; the admiration the cop held within her was growing with each and every moment she was in the woman's presence; at one point in her life, her own goals had been fixated in her mind, and she had been bound and determined to reach them at any cost. That determination had failed her in later years, however, and Silent Hill was near rock bottom for her; yet Rose's sudden appearance in her life had abruptly given way to a new set of ambitions, be they honest or dark; the woman's survival came first and foremost on her list of objectives now—even before her own preservation. Whatever the mother was doing to cause such a change in the lady deputy, Cybil was in no way eager for her to cease.

"No," she vociferated finally, shaking her head and lowering violet irises so as to blend them into ocean blue. "No…I've never been there."

Rose nodded to herself quietly, as if reassuring herself of something. A short time later and she had pivoted quickly on one scarred, leather heel, and started off toward a gap in the ancient fence, muttering a few words which were indiscernible to the officer who followed closely behind, removing the pistol from its holster, and stripping it of its safety. Suddenly, the blonde stopped, swinging herself around to face her friend.

"How many more bullets have you got in that gun?"


	18. Revelation

**A/N: **A special thanks goes out to all my lovely reviewers. You guys are the only reason I keep continuing this story. I had a massive bout of thought for this chapter, so forgive me if it's slightly confusing at the end. I'll try to clarify it in the next few if y'all don't get it here. Enjoy!

**

* * *

Chapter Eighteen**

The way through the abandoned auto field was rough; the ground beneath their feet shifted and swayed in protest to even their light masses; the enormous hill which towered hundreds of feet above them appeared to curve over and glare down at them forebodingly. Cybil had ashamedly admitted to Rose when they had started out that the plant demon had removed all the bullets from the pistol, and only returned the empty shell of said pistol; Rose however, had seemed unfazed, and had merely nodded before continuing on her determined way. Neither knew what was in store for them as they wandered amongst the outskirts of the forgotten, ash-coated town; the small size of Silent Hill convinced Rose that she had little to lose if she searched atop the mountain-like formation however, for she'd ventured into virtually every building elsewhere in the village. She had nowhere else to look but here.

Honestly, she didn't even know what she was looking for. If it was Dahlia, she'd have her work cut out for her; the strange woman was evasive as it were—if she was smart enough to realize she was indeed the subject of the two women's search, she would evade them even more carefully. The cop stuck close by to the young mother, having removed her baton after sheathing the pistol; even if it didn't act as quickly as the gun, she was an excellent handler of it, and could deliver a crushing blow should anything decide to snatch either of them up. Hell—in the past she'd killed one of the miners in the town with a single strike, had she not? Even so, Cybil was apprehensive, and prepared for anything. Or rather, she hoped she was.

The eerie silence of the abandoned lot was discomforting, but neither chose to let on such fact; while at one point in time Cybil had seemed the more dominant of the two, they were now equally matched, with the cop showing said dominance by way of physical strength and resourcefulness, and Rose by pure, unimpeded persistency. Either way, it remained so that fear was not something they wished to share with one another. At least not to a great extent, anyway.

Footstep by wary footstep, the two scaled the side of the surprisingly steep incline, but only with the assistance of a narrow path which proceeded to wrap around the exterior of the hill and provide somewhat of a trail. The going wasn't easy, by any means, yet 'twas manageable for them both, and particularly for Cybil, seeing as she was in much better physical condition than was Rose. For a time the cop allowed her friend to catch her breath before continuing on; she stood guard for the few minutes Rose needed, swinging the baton lazily about the air. When the mother made to stand, she lost her footing due to the narrow width of the trail, resulting in a sudden grabbing motion from the officer which landed on her upper arm and jerked her away from the edge; unintentionally the lady deputy found herself pinned between Rose and the rocky wall behind her; Rose scooted away before Cybil could say anything, and marched onward.

Long at last, the summit of the small mountain was in sight, and then it had been reached; the two women stopped to stare down at the expanse that was Silent Hill, and were perturbed at the unwelcome viewing of a large group of the long-tongued canines which meandered about in no particular direction outside a distant alleyway.

"Let's just hope they stay down there," muttered the cop, trying not to display her worry openly. Unfortunately, Rose saw straight through it, though she said nothing on the matter, instead choosing to remain silent. Turning 'round, she lay eye on a thick patch of what looked to be an ancient forest, whose gnarled trunks and crackled branches caked with dead and rust-colored leaves were just as enticing as they were ominous. Something cold and wet made its presence known a moment past; thin liquid, silvery in the dim light, paraded down her nose and dove off to one side just before reaching the tip; more followed as the rain became heavier and penetrated the thin layers of their clothing, and Rose's self-conscious nature arose upon realizing her thin blouse would shield nothing from sight when waterlogged. To make matters still worse, sirens screamed to life in the distance and jolting both into a state of brief panic, though it subsided considerably quicker in Cybil; she glanced around briefly, noting the darkening skies, and immediately snapped her hand to her shoulder so as to turn on a light she'd forgotten she'd possessed before. The trees did not melt into the sort of Hell that the rest of the forsaken Silent Hill did; Rose didn't have to wait for Cybil's words to know where they were supposed to go; dashing into the blackness of the forest, the sirens were immediately silenced, along with all other noises, save for the heaving breaths that protruded from the women's lungs.

Stumbling and tripping most of the way in, Rose collapsed to the ground after a few hundred feet, Cybil doing the same whilst shoving her back up against a tree if only for the comfort of knowing nothing could reach her from behind. Rose merely lay flat out with her hands and arms splayed out on either side of her head, her knees bent and placed nearly atop one another; had she not been moving her head from side to side, her figure would clearly have been one of a lifeless corpse. The beam from the shoulder light on Cybil's uniform shone into the all-too-quiet darkness; something glittered in said beam, refracting the light and twinkling innocently at her. Unwilling to allow Rose to see and pursue it, the officer shifted to place the ray upon her friend, effectively shielding the peculiar reflection from the young mother's ambitious eyes.

Propping herself up on her elbows, Rose examined what little she could see of the environment in which they currently found themselves to be locked within; forward an instant and she had sat up entirely, blinking her eyes and making a brim of her hand; Cybil took the hint and dimmed the light, aiming it downward as well, carefully avoiding the area in which she had seen the gleam.

"Why is it so quiet in here?" inquired the mother uselessly, standing up. She moved around a bit, looking up at the trees and doing her best to scrutinize them in the dark.

"Beats me. Can't say that I'm unhappy with it either." The cop rested her head against the base of the tree and expelled a deep sigh. "What I wouldn't give for a few hours of this, and a real fucking bed too."

"There's something over here!" Rose's voice was shockingly enthusiastic, a striking contrast to Cybil's more weary one, as she shouldered through the thick branches in the opposite direction as to which the officer had expected. The curiosity withheld by the Da Silva woman was incredible; Cybil's mind raced back to the words of the giant demon that had spoken of curiosity; was Rose only acting upon her curiosity because she'd trusted the being? It was unclear, but the woman was compelled to follow her friend lest she become the victim of some horrendous accident during which her only chance of survival would be Cybil herself; the skies were maleficent in their dingy hue as the two women crashed through a final barrier of tremendously protestant net of intertwined twigs and vines.

There didn't appear to be any monstrosities nearby, but Cybil wasn't about to take any unnecessary risks; she brandished the baton like a knight his sword, and then her violet eyes snapped to Rose's light frame, standing perilously close to the edge of what, from Cybil's position, looked to be a sheer, vertical drop. She hurriedly made her way toward her friend and reached out an arm to direct her a safe distance away from it, and then proceeded to gaze into what Rose was undoubtedly captivated by.

Beneath them lay a more thin layer of smoke and ash than what had been seen to choke the Hell-birthed Silent Hill; it slithered its way between the iron rail supports of the bridge, and viewable beyond its deceitful grey-ish coloration was an abnormally bright series of greens and blacks and yellows. Yes, beneath the bridge lay an identical bridge, and identical surroundings, but in full color, severed only by that one layer of ashen fog. 'Twas as if they were looking down upon their exact position from above. Cybil subconsciously moved forward another step or so, making sure to keep Rose back a few safe meters.

Bruising beneath her knee-high leather boots, the ground suddenly gave way; once solid stone transformed instantaneously into butter; the young cop's form was lost over the edge as Rose scrambled backward to avoid toppling over herself. A scream ripped from the blonde officer's throat as her baton was violently wedged between several lifeless tree roots erupting from the side of the mountain; she clutched desperately at it, calling on a good ten years of experience and training, as well as physical strength to prevent her hands from detaching themselves, all the while crying out for the help which Rose could never provide.

In the meantime, the panicked mother searched wildly through the dark until she came upon a vine which looked strong enough to support Cybil's weight; a part of it was still twirled many times around an enormous tree, giving it strength; Rose felt her way down its length until she reached its end, picking it up and throwing it over the edge of the cliff. It dangled before the woman, and she relinquished her hold on the baton so as to grip it with both hands and scurry part of the way upward. When she could go no further she called out to Rose, begging her to pull her up and over onto blesséd earth once more; she could not, the mother realized as she struggled to do the obviously impossible. Cybil would die here, and once again, 'twould be of her own doing.

An abrupt surge of motion nearly pulled Rose Da Silva backward and off her feet; a figure stood behind her, its colossal head of crimson-rusted iron aimed in her direction as it if could see the goings on, whilst scarred but muscular arms dragged the vine—and Cybil—upward effortlessly; not moments later and she lay face down upon the ground, breathing hard. An upward glance was cast in time to see the Red Pyramid release the vine and clutch a six-foot blade instead; in the background a scraggly human figure crouched in a poor attempt at stealth, her physique vanishing as the light came and the savior dissipated into ash. Not far from where the two were splayed out there rested a small, crooked structure of wood and stone; Rose scrambled to her feet and practically dragged her friend into it, setting her at last upon the moth-eaten excuse for a couch which was placed just inside, across from a damaged stove and blackened sink.

For a good few minutes, naught but the sound of labored breathing could be heard within the shed as both Rose and Cybil struggled to return the lost oxygen to their hungry lungs. When near silence was reached, the cop raised irises of violet to claim blue; the tattered and tangled blonde locks that made up Rose's hair were swept backward and tucked away behind her ear by way of Cybil's quaking fingers. The mother pulled away instinctively, her mind reverting to the moment in the street in which Cybil had removed herself from a similar, albeit more extreme gesture; she wished not to make the moment into something it would never be. An expression of surprise, and perhaps even hurt, crossed the young cop's features as Rose did so; tearing her eyes away, she sighed resignedly and shifted to lean back against the rather uncomfortable couch. Rose eyed her perceptively.

"Tell me that triangle-head…thing…didn't just help you." Cybil's gaze was centered elsewhere in the small cabin, avoiding Rose's.

"You should be happy about it. If I'd been alone, you wouldn't be here right now. And it would have been my fault. Again."

"It wasn't ever your fault Rose."

Silence.

Tense silence.

Finally, Rose looked in her friend's direction, and took the initiative to force Cybil to return her gaze, reaching out as the cop had once done to her and turning her head to face the sea blue of her own sorrowful eyes. "Sometimes I wonder what it is that we want out of this place," the mother said softly, dropping her hands back to her lap and her sights back to the floor.

"Something more than either of us are getting, I presume," Cybil retorted easily.

"I want a cure. For Sharon, I mean. I want to see Chris again, and I want to go _home_. Why can't I just go home?"

"Because Sharon is a part of this place Rose. And you're a part of her. Silent Hill wouldn't let its people go thirty years ago. What makes you think it'd let _you_ go now?"

Rose was thoughtful for a brief minute.

"I know what's really happened. I don't pray to a God that's not here, and I eliminated those who did. Except for Galia, her followers, and Alessa's mother. And I blindly adopted a part of the sinner's daughter. I've replaced Dahlia—and her sin—with myself. Shared sin now."

Cybil stared at her in confusion, her words making little sense to her.

"What are you talking about? Dahlia was hated for however it was she conceived that child. You had nothing to do with it."

"No! Christabella tried to dispose of the sin, and it didn't work!" cried Rose, shaking her head with wide-eyes. "Alessa was still the sin, and Sharon is a part of Alessa. The mother of the sin was the sinner. I willingly led myself into that trap. I've become the sinning mother. And in order to get us out of here, the real sinner has to die, because the sin had no control over her own conception, meaning she was innocent!"

"So that's what the plant meant?" Cybil asked wearily, her brain not entirely following the twisted trail of intended logic that Rose had lain out before her. "But why would your death have any significance if the real sinner was still alive? The plant said that _one_ of you must perish—why, if Dahlia is all that matters, would it imply that your death could free us too?"

Rose's sea eyes opened wider, if it was even possible, and she stared at the cop with a horrifying realization present on her face.

"Oh god. Cybil—I think—I think I _am_ Dahlia."


	19. Under the Influence

**A/N: **I aplogize for the short length of this chapter--It was mainly done just so I could set up the next one. I've got SATs to study for for the remainder of the afternoon, and I take them tomorrow, so I'm hoping to update again Sunday, but no guarantees. In the meantime, enjoy, and thanks a ton to all my reviewers!

**

* * *

Chapter Nineteen**

Naught but sheer bewilderment shown upon the youthful expression of the lady deputy as she absorbed, or rather tried to absorb, the Da Silva woman's words. How could she possibly be correct in her assumptions? In Cybil's eyes, there was absolutely no plausible way that Rose could _be_ anyone but Rose, and even if she could, how would she have been in two places at once, as she had implied was the case? Not to say that the seemingly impossible hadn't shown possible in this place, but this was different; human beings couldn't physically appear in more than one place at once, regardless of whether they were in Silent Hill or not.

"That's just not possible," the cop said finally, breaking the awkward silence that had followed her declaration. "Rose—You can't _do_ that." Her features were creased in apprehension, her mouth set in a stern frown which told of her thoughts; what if Rose was right in her thinking? Well, it certainly wouldn't have been the first time she was wrong about something, and she frowned even deeper at the memories.

The mother turned to gaze at her friend inquiringly, as if wondering just how she could say that something was impossible in such a place as the one in which they currently resided; Rose knew better, and she had apparently mistakenly presumed the same of Cybil Bennett. 'Twas a shame; she'd thought the woman smarter than that. With a sigh of genuine fatigue and dismay, Rose stood up, and responded as she did so.

"It would make perfect sense Cybil," she began tiredly. "When I took in Sharon, she was a part of Dahlia's daughter, and by the look of things, she still is, perhaps even more so than she was originally. In doing that, I've confused whatever forces have condemned this place to its ashen Hell; I've made them think I'm trying to take Dahlia's place." She paused, staring down at the dusty, cracked floorboards. "Do you remember what we saw when we looked over the edge of that cliff?"

Violet eyes shifted cautiously.

"It seemed like we were looking at ourselves, only…we weren't actually there."

"And it wasn't the same color as everything else around here."

"So…what exactly are you getting at?"

"I think this God forsaken town has sucked us into a second dimension."

Cybil was awed by the simplicity of her explanation, and even more so by the clarity it provided. If they had indeed found themselves trapped in another dimension, as crazy as it seemed, she would be able to understand just why it was she had never recalled Silent Hill being the ash-caked horror that it was currently exposing itself to be, little by little. During her previous visit to the town, it had never existed as it did now. At least, not to her knowledge. For once in her life, she quite suddenly realized, she was accepting something that was against anything she had ever dared to accept in the past, and more so accepting it based on the words of an almost total stranger. Silent Hill certainly had worked some semblance of magic upon her, be it positive or negative. With a strangely determined face, the cop spoke once again.

"Well then let's find Dahlia, and get the Hell out of here."

She was _so_ going to kick herself for that in the morning.

Rose offered her hand, and Cybil shoved her wrist into it while gripping Rose's own; with a forceful tug she pulled the surprisingly lightweight officer to her feet; following only moments after, the young mother found herself to be pinned against one crooked wall, with a certain cop's dexterity keeping her there, and absolutely no means of circumventing the robust contact of Cybil's lips upon her own. 'Twas brief, however, for the violet-eyed woman knew of the risks she had taken in committing such an act, an act so intensified being that 'twas the second time she had done such a thing in this town of unresolved hate; she pulled back at the precise moment Rose projected an exceptionally staunch shove of her own. Both deemed that it had not been out of disgust that the mother had done so however, but rather a repetitive case of shock, as Cybil had experienced upon the first incident of the kind, though Rose did not proceed to return the act, as her friend had done earlier in their journey. Nor did either bother expressing concern over the matter; the only words spoken came from the lady deputy, and they were surprisingly calm and collected.

"Just wanted to make sure I'd done that in case we get ourselves killed."

The visible size of Rose's eyes gradually receded back to normal.

"You're rather unconventional at times Officer Bennett. I hope you know that."

"Unfortunately Rose, you started it."

A rolling of the eyes preceded the mother's form turning and hurrying from the ancient shed, with a woman in uniform following closely behind.


	20. Return to Abnormality

**A/N: **I apologize for the lengthy wait between chapters. I've had loads of exams to study for, and finals and state tests are coming up soon as well. I shall do my best to continue posting chapters regularly, but there is no guarantee they'll be posted anytime soon. I do plan on finishing, but for the time being, I am short on time. In the meantime, ejoy, and thanks to all my reviewers!

* * *

**Chapter Twenty**

The return to the outside world was as welcoming as it could be in such a place as Silent Hill; the forces of the living darkness were no longer in effect, and the Red Pyramid remained absent from their field of view. Rose found that she was nearly certain the raggedy figure she had seen crouched in the distance behind the being during Cybil's rescue had been Dahlia herself; she recalled, with slight amounts thought towards the matter, that she had seen Dahlia near to the same creature in the past. When Anna had died…Dahlia had administered the same motion of the hand at Anna which Christabella had used upon Rose after claiming her to be a witch; shortly following, the Red Pyramid had materialized behind the mother's and cop's short-lived companion, and had torn the life from the young woman's body—quite literally, in fact. Was Dahlia in control of such a monstrosity? Was the Pyramid there to do her bidding? And if that was the case, why would the woman have tried to kill Rose by way of that blasted Jeep, yet make certain to preserve Cybil's life?

In all honesty it made no sense whatsoever to the young mother, as she strode through the small patch of forest with Cybil sticking near to her side. In her hand she carried a thick but flexible vine; in case she needed to defend them at any time, she'd explained, and she imitated a strangulation by placing it around her neck for a short moment. Rose quickly pulled it down though, scolding her for trusting the thing wouldn't turn into some great snake-like living thing and do just what Cybil had intended to do to any entities which befell their path. In truth, it was a far-off chance, but one Rose just wasn't willing to take. She had grown too attached to the sturdy female; not a soul on earth could convince her to let even the most seemingly insignificant risks be taken in relation to Cybil Bennett. Not to mention the fact that something _else_ looked as if it were growing between them; whether their 'relationship' was a positive or negative concern remained to be seen.

The two resumed walking side-by-side down the rough slope that they had trekked up just a short while ago; every so often they would reach a particularly rough section and the cop would insist Rose take her hand for extra balance; Rose would make certain that each time such an action was taken, she was to relinquish her hold as soon as was possible. Just before reaching the level ground of the ancient street below, the mother's cerulean irises caught hold of a figure in what appeared to name itself white silk, with a crimson ribbon capturing dark brown locks in a thick, low, ponytail. The figure was flanked by two miners. Galia. Rose's steps faltered and she felt hands gripping her waist in an obvious attempt to prevent the fall she would have inevitably taken in their absence.

"For Christ's sake Rose—will you be careful?"

Heated blue met violet, and the mother snapped back her own reply.

"I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself, if you'd give me a goddamn chance once in a while."

The cop shook her head and suddenly realized her hands had not left Rose's waist, though she made short work of that fact, and she removed them quickly. Her eyes looked swiftly in the opposite direction, biting her tongue until she had composed a less harsh remark of her own, and muttered it only just loud enough for Rose to hear it.

"Sorry for caring."

Choosing to ignore the statement, Rose broke into a long-stride jog down the steep face of the hill, stumbling at the sudden leveling of the earth, and was brought to one knee, saving herself from falling completely when she threw her arms out before her. Cybil's pace increased until she reached the same level ground as Rose, but rather than assisting her friend to her feet, she simply slowed to a walk and stood beside the mother, shaking her head and putting her hands on her hips.

"There you go Rose. Take care of yourself."

Righting herself, Rose proceeded to brush herself off, and then looked up at the cop with an annoyed expression written across her face. She said nothing, just as she had done before; instead she merely trudged onward in the direction of the town, weaving her way between the rusty skeletons of long since dead vehicles, though she traveled by way of a thin trail directed away from the chain link fence and the ancient bridge. 'Twas a route she hadn't taken in the past, and she presumed the same for Cybil; in the distance she could hear what sounded to be human voices, yet the mother was far too great a distance from Galia and her followers for the source to have been the lady in white.

A looming mass of twisted metal and half-burned wood blocked the pair's view until Rose proceeded to approach and peer around it; she let out a short, partially strangled gasp in the instant before she pulled herself swiftly back 'round; Cybil's protective instincts immediately kicked in, and she rushed forward to see what had caused the surprise. She also peered around the edge of the mass, being careful where to place her hands lest she slice them open upon the jagged, rusty edges; now fully able to see what had spooked Rose, the cop herself drew back.

A mass of what may have been thirty or more long-tongued canines scurried about like disturbed ants; something had upset them, and while they didn't appear to have focused their attention in she and Rose's general direction, Cybil wasn't about to write it off the list of possibilities. She peeked through a space between two iron rails jutting out of the pile, and realized with horror that every one of these canines was fully able to see; their eyes, unlike the others the cop and the mother had encountered, were not sealed shut by flesh. The vine quivered in the cop's hand, tapping against the nearby metals for a moment, and then Rose snatched the end of it to silence the noise. The mother frowned and mouthed the word 'Quiet!' to the lady deputy, dropping the vine in the process. Cybil switched it to her other hand to be sure it would not strike anything and produce unnecessary noise.

Abruptly, one of the dogs let out its ferocious, wild-cat-like roar, and leapt at some unknown entity; a yelp instantaneously followed, and the dog creature was seen to be soaring back in the direction that it had come, its great body sliced raggedly in two. Still alive, its frontal half lay on the ground about ten meters from Cybil's position, groaning in anguish and shuddering horribly. Less than a minute later, motion ceased, and the monster lay silent. The remaining beasts had stopped their darting about to watch the goings on; another dared to leap at whatever it was that had enticed the first dog to do the same, and soon the second too was returned in several pieces.

Rose moved closer to Cybil so as to look over her shoulder without exposing herself; the cop did her best to ignore the warm breath shooting down the back of her neck as the dog-slayer moved into the two's range of vision. The Red Pyramid, flanked by Dahlia, Galia, and the two miners, raised his massive blade and cut down on another canine; Rose gasped and shut her eyes as she pulled back; the enormous cranium of the Pyramid suddenly rotated in the direction of the women, and the form of Dahlia could be seen pointing viciously at them as well. The officer ducked behind the mass, breathing hard and beginning to shove Rose backward in the opposite direction. Before she could move herself, however, a great roar split the deathly silence, and Cybil cast her glance round long enough to see that the Pyramid had successfully maneuvered the beastly canines into a full-out stampede, their fear of the enormous blade driving them straight toward the mother and her friend.

"Around the back, Rose! Now!"

The young mother did her best to keep herself out of the way of the more physically fit cop, but she was unable to do so upon such a realization as the fact that before them both was the same sticky, pulsing, acidic goop that had injured Cybil upon their arrival to the tainted town. Desperately glancing in all directions, the Da Silva woman thought quickly and turned to bound up the dangerously sharp pile of steel and other metals; Cybil followed suit, the ends of the scraps carving chunks out of her hands and legs like jack-o-lanterns; Rose was suffering similar injuries, but they were the least of her concerns at the moment. One of the dogs spotted their motions as it skidded 'round a bend; a howl was emitted, and the brainless creature launched itself a good seven feet up the pile, its lengthy appendage nearly wrapping itself 'round the custom boots Cybil had been so worried about. Pierced through the abdomen by a particularly jagged piece of iron, the monstrosity whimpered loudly and died; noticing its plight, other members of the group altered their directions to match those of the dead. The two women reached the summit of the monstrous metal hill; on all sides, entities, or what they assumed to be entities, watched.

"Great fucking idea Rose," Cybil panted, her back pressed firmly against the mother's. "Now what the Hell are we supposed to do?"


	21. Paroxysm

**A/N:** FINALLY. Sorry I took so long. Hopefully the length of this chapter will make up for it. And I'm also saying FINALLY for another reason as well. -wink wink-

* * *

**Chapter Twenty One**

Canines, Pyramids, and old women galore, Rose snapped back to attention as Cybil's voice invaded her ears, hard and domineering, yet within it a note of desperate pleading which seemed to suggest that for once she was truly out of ideas. The young mother wasn't sure she liked that fact—after all, it meant that she would have to do the quick thinking for the second time in only a few minutes—not to mention that her first attempt at an escape was what had led them into their current predicament as it were. Her hands and legs were scraped and bleeding, and Cybil's did not appear to be in much better condition; an ashen breeze sifted through the frayed locks of once blonde hair, and the suddenly reassuring pressure of Cybil's frame against her own gradually managed to calm her down to the point at which rational thought was capable.

A swift turning of her feminine physique aimed her in the direction of a particularly long section of what might have been railroad iron jutting out from the mass upon which they were uncomfortably settled for the time being; Cybil watched worriedly as the mother carefully picked her way across the surface of the rusted pile to place first one, then both, feet atop the ancient rail. The cop's mouth opened just slightly as she realized exactly what Rose was doing; the young mother, currently surveying the black mass of acid which clung to the path below, appeared to be measuring distance. Eyeing the canines and those with the Red Pyramid, the deputy tripped and scuttled her way over to stand behind Rose as quickly and as steadily as she could manage. Her whispered voice cut the air more sharply than the terrible roars of the beasts below.

"Rose—this is _not_ a good idea."

Apparently, however, the woman had already made up her mind. She quite abruptly stepped back from about a meter from the end of the rail and clutched the cross on her necklace tightly, closing her eyes and tilting her head upward. Cybil was taken aback, having not truly viewed her friend as the religious type, for she herself was anything but; Rose finished her quiet prayer and turned to lock eyes with the cop, and to speak.

"We have no choice Cybil."

"Yes we do."

"Fine then. You do it your way and see how far you get."

The cop stared after the woman as she moved closer to the end of the rail once again, examining one last time the distance from its tip to the tar caked earth below. It was quite a drop, but nothing that would kill them—or so she hoped. They would need to make it beyond the black goop though, lest they fall into it and let its sticky hold disintegrate their bodies as it had Cybil's boot. The mother repeated her earlier actions, stepping back a meter and then two, and glanced at Cybil.

"Wait until I'm out before you come down after me," Rose instructed the cop sternly, the command odd seeing as it was coming from her. She'd never been one to take charge over Cybil's actions, but 'twas necessary at this point in time, she reasoned. The cop, however, did not seem keen to accept anything but being in charge.

"Wait a minute Rose—When you're out of _what_?" Cybil asked hurriedly, stepping up closer to the woman while being careful not to offset either of their balance. In the background, the snarls and slurps of canines filled the area.

Abruptly, the sound of shoes on iron rocketed through the chorus of friends and foes, and the cop watched in horror as her friend made a rather clumsy leap from the tip of the railroad iron; to her amazement, neither the Pyramid, the canines, or their human counterparts appeared to have seen the suicidal leap. After a few moments of what to Rose felt like weightlessness, the mother crashed to the earth with a sickening thud; her small frame log-rolled several times before coming to rest with her back against hard stone. She was dazed, and sore, and she probably shouldn't have moved, but she did so anyway. Lifting her head only just, she was able to see that she had completely missed the acidic tar which blocked the way for the canines and the others to reach her.

From atop the pile, Cybil saw the young mother set her head back against the ground once more, her chest heaving and struggling to catch her breath. The cop swore quietly to herself and then mirrored Rose's vault, though she was not so lucky as to miss the tar; her leather boots struck it first, and the sudden grip of the substance jerked her slim body into it, sinking first her left hip and then her left shoulder into the mass. She did her best not to cry out at the stinging sensation which nearly overwhelmed her, lest she be heard by the nearby entities. After all, she had no idea what they were capable of; perhaps the canines could easily jump over the acid, as she and Rose had tried to do. A final shifting of her weight resulted in her freeing herself from the sticky mess, and dragging herself out of its midst.

Rose rested a few meters away, still straining to breath, and the cop quickly realized that the worry she felt was unjustified; the poor mother had had nothing more than the wind knocked out of her. Ignoring the burning of the acid which still clung to her uniform and bare arms, the officer scurried over to her friend and positioned herself so that her face was where Rose could see it without turning her own. A firm hand was placed on her stomach, presumably so that the cop would be able to tell more precisely when her friend was properly able to breathe, and a cool but hurried voice filled the mother's ears.

"Exhale," she said quietly, though not so quiet as to not be heard over the sounds of the nearby entities. "You're hyperventilating."

It took a few moments, but the mother did eventually manage to get her breathing rating under control; Cybil helped her to her feet, instinctively glancing around for the foes she knew would eventually see them once they began moving. Her side still burned from the acid as it continued to peck away at her skin, but she didn't complain aloud, choosing rather to simply clench her teeth to the point at which Rose noticed and sucked in a quick gasp.

"Cybil!" she cried, suddenly swarming her friend with probing hands as she attempted to examine the extent of the damage. "Why the Hell can't you ever tell me when you're hurt!" She snatched the woman's arm and practically dragged her forward, noting the fact that the Red Pyramid had since rounded the bend that was the pile of metal from which they had just leapt, and his cranium was seemingly aimed in their direction. Galia, the miners, and the raggedy woman Dahlia moved with him, as he drove the canines to the edge of the black goop, around which they crowded, desperate to escape the six foot blade of the Pyramid, but not so desperate as to test the acid before them. A certain brunette's gaze suddenly locked onto that of Rose's, and the mother jump-started into motion.

"Come on!" she cried as she snatched Cybil's hand once again—not having realized she'd let go—and the two bolted side-by-side for shelter. In her pocket the syringe, which she had nearly forgotten was present there, pressed into her thigh—though the presence of the plastic cap on the point ensured it did not prick her. They rounded a corner and raced across the road to the side opposite that of the one which possessed the old rusty autos; Rose took note of the enormous sign proclaiming a misleading _Welcome to Silent Hill_, and released Cybil's gloved hand as the land beneath their feet grew considerably steeper. The mother ducked behind the sign and awaited Cybil, only a few steps behind.

"We need to get you cleaned up," Rose muttered softly, somewhat out of breath yet again. Cybil shook her head halfheartedly.

"I'll be okay. It's not bad."

"Well that black stuff should be washed off at least. I know what it feels like."

"Fine."

"There's a barber's shop not far from here. We'll just have to pray they have running water still."

"Praying doesn't seem to be of much use in this town."

"Don't mock religion, Cybil."

"Fine."

The two stared long and hard at one another before Rose turned and walked off in the direction of the town; the cop, fatigued, followed closely behind, limping somewhat as the burning moved down her legs and into her boots. She had to admit the mother was right—she _did_ need to get the stuff off her uniform. At least the uniform was slowing the progress though.

The sound of the canines could still be heard in the far off distance, but 'twas steadily and surely fading as the two made their way through the ash coated brush located on the slope a good fifty feet down from the road. Cybil eventually moved up to walk beside her friend, still frustrated at her lack of a working gun, and instead carrying a large piece of metal she had picked up during their walk. Rose remained focused ever so intently on their destination, whilst Cybil kept an eye out for any approaching monstrosities. As she did so, she pondered aloud.

"I don't understand why that woman would have helped us if she only wanted to kill us later," the cop proclaimed with a frown, drawing Rose's attention back to her. "And what the Hell prompted Dahlia's sudden turnaround in attitude? She was all about 'saving' us the last time we were here, wasn't she?" The blonde turned to look at the mother, who pulled her eyes away before contact could be made, and focused them on the path once more.

"That plant thing must have told her what it told us. No doubt Dahlia wants out of here just as much, if not more, than we do," Rose replied cautiously, still not looking Cybil's way. "And now, knowing that, she's realized that if she kills me she can get out."

"But what about Galia? Why is she helping her?"

"I suspect they made a deal. That woman has influence over the survivors—she's be more than willing to help out anyone who thought they knew a way out of this—this..."

"Shit hole?" Cybil finished in a grumble. She shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose for a moment before speaking again. "Do you remember what Galia said back in the library? About the devil manifesting himself within you?"

Rose stopped and at last looked at her, remaining silent.

"What if that plant did something to you? What if that was the devil?"

"As far as I know, the devil doesn't _assist_ people in evading him."

"The devil seems to run this place, Da Silva. Why wouldn't it be a possibility?"

To this, Rose had no preconceived answer; instead she simply began walking again, spotting their destination only a few hundred feet ahead. Her pace quickened; Cybil bit her tongue as another wave of burning washed over her. Before they reached it, Cybil reached out and gripped her friend's shoulder.

"She said you'd become a whole demon, Rose. If you have, it would explain why they're trailing us."

"I'm under the impression that the phrase 'whole demon' meant I'd look like one of those…things," responded the young mother, shuddering lightly as a sudden breeze swept over them both. Glancing swiftly upward, both women laid eyes on a creature of enormous size and, much to their horror, _wingspan_; swooping down, and with a haunting wail, the beastly creature ejected two bird-like feet to which were attached six inch talons. Cybil instantaneously shoved Rose through the ancient door of the barber's shop; one talon grazed her shoulder, but succeeded only in slicing her uniform rather than her skin. Slamming the door shut behind them, the cop collapsed to the floor alongside Rose, both breathing hard, and listening to the horrid screeching of the beast of air.

Rose was the first to recover.

"Well that's new."

Cybil glared at her as she sat up, pinching the bridge of her nose with her gloved fingers once again, resulting in a curious glance from the blonde mother.

"C'mon. There's got to be some towels or something here I can use."

"I'll try the water," offered the lady deputy, more for the knowledge that it would give her something to do, rather than actually wanting to help. Whilst Rose combed the dirtied floor and cupboards for cloth, Cybil made her way over to one of the old sinks in which customers would have washed their hair. Examining the numerous faucets, she found one that looked as if it were in relatively good working order, and reached out to turn the knob. Hesitating before making contact, she half expected some sort of demonic transformation to occur when she did finally touch it and shift it to the _Hot_ position.

Nothing happened, but before she turned away, a single drop of water fell from within the faucet, followed by a trail of what appeared to be the same black substance which was still proceeding to eat away at the officer's flesh. Yet she knew otherwise only a few moments later when the substance didn't sizzle or hiss upon touching the inside surface of the sink. Rose returned with a stained white washcloth and stood behind the cop to watch over her shoulder as the black goop suddenly stopped falling from the faucet. There was a moment of nothingness, and then quite abruptly a surge of brown, rust-tainted, water.

Both women jumped backward as the spray hit them, the noise loud but at the same time welcome; a brilliant laugh escaped the mother as she wiped the grimy liquid from her face, watching as it gradually cleared until 'twas almost taking the appearance of normal tap water. Cybil moved towards the spray and turned the knob the opposite direction so as to slow the stream, and then was brushed aside when Rose moved to fill a small bucket with the liquid. When the cop sent a questioning glance, the woman responded, "Don't know how long this'll last. It's better to fill up than to let run out."

Nodding, the cop glanced out the window of the shop and skyward, scanning for any sign of the flighty creature that had tried to attack them earlier. She noted the presence of curtains pulled back from the window, and quickly moved to pull them shut, if only for peace of mind; she didn't want anything to know of she and Rose's presence there. She turned around to spot Rose dragging a rather flimsy looking stool in her direction, and she realized after a moment that she was being instructed to sit on it. Doing so cautiously, for fear of the bedraggled frame crunching into pieces beneath even her own light mass.

"Do you think it's possible for you to get rid of that shirt?" Rose asked with a chuckle, to which Cybil responded by way of a surprised expression which then melted into one of understanding. Rose clarified anyway as the buttons of the sheriff's blue blouse were undone by gloved fingertips. "It'll be easier without it."

Having removed the top, Cybil's hands made to unclasp the back buckle of her bra, for she knew Rose would ask for her to remove it eventually as well, seeing as the majority of her left side—including areas of her chest—were covered in blisters and sores from the acid's presence. She folded her arms 'round to protect whatever amount of her dignity she still possessed, shielding her breasts from the other woman's view. Her face grew red; though she was doing so only for the purpose of assistance, the young cop had not exposed herself in such a manner to another in over a decade. Rose dipped the cloth in the lukewarm water, wringing it out before dabbing it carefully first onto her friend's shoulder.

"You know," she commented as she wiped away the substance, "You don't have anything to hide that I haven't seen before."

Muttering something indecipherable, Cybil was caught off guard when the mother gripped her lower left arm and pulled it from it's shielding position against her chest, dipping the cloth into the water once again, and allowing it to run over the angry marks on the skin. Unintentionally catching the young mother's cerulean eye, Cybil blinked and snapped her gaze to the floor, wincing as the water hit a particularly sensitive sore.

"Good Lord Cybil—Are you aware this stuff was dripping down your side too? You're going to need to take care of your lower half by yourself."

Without thinking, the cop blurted out, "Why not you?"

Blinking and pausing for a moment, Rose raised her eyebrow and dipped the cloth in the bucket once again. "Very well then. Strip it."

Realizing just what she had done, the cop narrowed her eyes and stood up, making to snatch the cloth and move to another area of the shop where she could indeed tend to her own injuries; Rose however, pulled the object away before she could succeed, and chuckled.

"Come on now," she said, her smile fading. "You know I only mean to help."

For a long moment the lady deputy simply gazed at her friend, violet and cerulean blending into one brilliant shade of blue; she frowned severely, and eyed the old version of a sectional couch which lined the side wall of the shop, no doubt arranged with the purpose of seating customers whilst they awaited service; hesitantly she made her way to sit on the moth-eaten cushions, still feeling far beyond overly exposed. She glanced in Rose's direction as she sat down, reluctantly making to undo the button and zipper of her precious leather pants; noting the discomfort of her friend, Rose turned her back as Cybil undressed, hearing the sound of a cupboard opening and closing which signaled she had retrieved something from within them.

"All set," came the lady deputy's voice a moment past, stern and misleadingly unconcerned, and Rose rounded on her slowly, giving her ample time to change her mind. Alas, she realized with a chuckle, there was no need for mind changing—the woman had found an extra towel and cloaked the majority of her body within its stained material, leaving only the necessary areas open for viewing. The cop herself seemed surprised at the extent of the damage done, for she spent a moment or so leaning over to examine herself prior to Rose's soon to come repetitive actions.

Shaking her head, the mother moved swiftly and purposefully to sit beside her friend, bringing the bucket and the cloth along with her. Wasting no time, she dipped the decaying fabric into the water and withdrew it almost instantaneously to place it upon the singed flesh of the other woman's hip.

She hissed and pulled away, more bothered by the cloth's touch on the more sensitive skin, but Rose reacted by second nature and snatched her bare knee in ash coated palms to prevent her from moving too much again. Violet eyes were seen to make an equally swift snapping motion to the bare flesh upon which the young mother's hand unthinkingly but comfortably rested; the same eyes watched apprehensively as her friend went to work on her thigh, sopping up all the dried blood which had leaked out between the acidic coating, along with the coating itself; the officer couldn't help but be suddenly fascinated by the woman's hands. She admired their shapely design and feminine qualities; she admired their inherent strength and their apparent sense of duty…and realized with a jolt that whilst she had been staring and pondering, the hands had ceased movement. She shook her head and looked up.

"It's not as clean as it should be, but it'll keep you going for a while."

"That's it?"

The mother, having stood up, made a strange face as she turned.

"I can only do so much Cybil. What did you expect?"

Blinking and shooting her eyes to the floorboards, Cybil narrowed them and muttered, "Nothing." A moment's pause. "I guess I thought it would take longer."

Tossing the cloth into the bucket, Rose bent down to pick up the partially burned uniform top, and then sat down on the couch again, scrutinizing the blackened fabric. Cybil subconsciously glanced at her pants which lay out of her reach. Maybe if she sat there long enough, Rose would get them for her and she wouldn't have to move.

"I could've taken longer," Rose said calmly, suddenly thinking of Sharon for an unexplained reason. She forced her attention back to the present. "But you were so red I thought you might overheat or something."

Cybil smiled in half embarrassment, not entirely sure she liked the idea of Rose mentioning such fact, but she nonetheless let it go.

"Sorry," she said as she turned her gaze away. "I haven't—well, not in a long time, anyway—" Trailing off, she moved her eyes so as to stare at the curtains covering the window, wondering to herself if there were any foes beyond her range of sight. After another minute or so of silence, her gaze fell on the mother's downcast face. "We should get some rest."

"Yes. Rest. That sounds good."

"You can have the couch."

"I don't have to take the whole thing you know."

"One of us has to keep watch anyway Rose. Just get some sleep."

Cerulean eyes met violet as the young mother watched the other woman try to give orders with naught but a towel shielding her from view; it was only partially welcome to Rose, for whilst she was greatly appreciative of the cop's stern, no-nonsense, demeanor, she found also that she rather liked the idea that someone as hard as Cybil Bennett could also have a softer, more human, side to her persona. The ancient towel rippled as the lady deputy bent to pick up the precious black leather coverings which would soon be placed over the marred skin of the left side which Rose had helped to clean; she noted the heavy curves seemingly accentuated by the thin coverings of the fabric. She half wondered if the roughened exterior Cybil had displayed on virtually every occasion during which she and Rose had spoken was the reality beneath the coverings of the towel. A simple slip of the cloth and she might be able to find out.

Parting her lips slightly with the realization of just where her mind was straying, dirty blonde locks swung through the air and brushed against the face closest to them as Rose shook her head defiantly to herself; Cybil squeezed into the pants, her back turned, and then with the towel still wrapped about her upper potions, made to pick up her bra and to take the uniform top from the armrest of the couch next to Rose. She slipped both on, sparing two buttons upon putting on the uniform, and allowed a light smile to creep across her features when she spied Rose shuffling about into a presumably more comfortable position on the couch. Her knees were drawn up towards her chest, and her arms tucked up under her chin; long lashed lids flickered shut, but the irises beneath still moved.

The cop, watching from a distance of six or so feet away, started to roll the towel up but seemed to have thought better of it. Her heeled leather boots sounded, causing Rose to open her eyes and lift her head up with a worried expression written across her features; Cybil stopped for a brief instant, as if frozen by her friend's vision, but then continued toward her. Letting the towel drop to its full, stained, length once again, she placed it over her friend. Although she knew it would do nothing in the way of providing any extra comfort, 'twas the gesture itself which earned her a hesitant but faintly genuine smile from the young blonde haired mother.

Turning away, the sound of footsteps could be heard once again if only to imply that Cybil was currently making her way up to the window of the shop; the light creak of gloved hands preceded the motion of the curtains being pulled only slightly out of the way so as to allow violet irises to view the surrounding area. Seeing no sign of danger, she carefully placed the curtains back to their original position, ensuring that any creatures which might have been lurking beyond her sight did not spot the sudden movement. Rose had since moved to prop herself up on one elbow, and apparently possessed insight as to the officer's inherent weariness.

"Will you get over here?" the mother insisted, sounding fatigued herself.

Cybil slanted her eyebrows in a worried fashion.

"Without you I'll never do anybody any good," Rose added.

A true smile split the blonde's face, but she made sure to give a well timed roll of her eyes before sitting down at the other end of the couch. Mimicking Rose's position, she pulled her legs up onto the decaying cushions and gratefully laid her head upon the armrest. The exhaustion she felt quite suddenly and very nearly overwhelmed her, and unwilling though she was, her body immediately sagged into the softness of the couch, begging for sleep. A rare peace had overcome them both, and while the time would have been ideal for the rest which the lady deputy had intended them, she found she could not do so in knowing that there was no soul to watch over her dearest friend.

Sitting up, the blonde checked for shadows through the thin curtains over the window, and then lowered her gaze to find that of the young Rose. Her face was smudged with dirt and ash, and without speaking a word, the cop got to her feet, retrieved the washcloth from the bucket of water, and carried it over to her friend.

"Hold still," she demanded calmly, to which Rose responded by way of a narrowing of the eyes and a slight shifting of her position into one of a more upright stance; Cybil instantly placed her free hand roughly on the other woman's shoulder, forcing her backside against the back of the couch, making certain that she had made her point. Rose, abruptly reminded of the fact that Cybil Bennett was indeed an officer of the law, and of the fact that she was therefore more powerful in physicality than she herself, chose to behave. She was surprised when the sensation of water and fabric crossed her face, but realized after a moment of thought that the cop was obsessing over cleanliness herself now; a few seconds past and Rose Da Silva's face was cleared of ashen scars, and the cloth had been tossed back into the bucket a second time.

Locking eyes for a brief instant, the Da Silva woman took in the depth of what she was able to see of her friend's emotions, and reasoned with herself about just what they meant. She understood that there was a helpful partnership between the two, but after so many incidents, Rose was certain there was something more. To make matters worse, her mind was rushing her, for she knew there probably wouldn't be a second chance to simply engage herself in the moment and enjoy what she was given in return; with a jolt she realized that Cybil seemed to be reading just as much into her own thoughts as they sat there, perfectly content with one another in one instant, and then utterly lost in a surge of emotion the next.

A quaint and desperate crushing together of two pairs of chapped lips erased all lack of certainty either had felt previously; Rose found herself being pressed rather forcefully into the back of the couch as her friend and unrecognized crush moved to her right side, sliding her down so that she was laying on her back. Gloved hands traveled the length of her body and back again, insistent and determined but nevertheless astonishingly gentle in their administrations. They reached for the base of one half-destroyed blouse, not bothering to undo the buttons but rather to slide the wretched thing up and over the housewife's head. Surprisingly eager to aide in whatever way she could, Rose wriggled her hands and arms up so as to make the removal easier, and then went to work on the buttons of the god forsaken uniform of blue which hovered above her.

As Cybil proceeded to unclasp the front of her friend's bra, Rose succeeded in removing the blouse and the bra beneath, to which Cybil reacted by way of an immediate shrinking back and a concealment of her unmentionables. She ceased in her movements, as if suddenly aware of just what she was getting herself into; Rose's breathing was slightly ragged as she tried to slow her heart rate. With eyes soft but narrowed, she cautiously reached upward to grip the cop's forearm as she had done for the cleaning and pulled it, not especially easily, out of the way. Calm fingertips traced the area surrounding the full breasts, her eyes refusing to make contact with the woman she touched; not soon after she felt the telltale warning of leather slipping 'neath the waistline of her jeans, though she did not pull away at the contact as the officer had.

Lower coverings and undergarments removed, the young mother realized with a start that she was now completely nude and lying beneath the one person she would never have suspected would actually agree to take such actions as she was now. She'd remained faithful to her husband for nearly a decade, and now here she was throwing it all away for a fit of passion which she would most likely regret come the following day. What was she doing? She didn't know, and right about then, she really didn't care, and instead reached for the zipper of the leather pants, only to feel the woman hesitate and pull away a second time.

"Play fair Cybil," came the soft voice of a mother so aching for happiness in a world so dead; cerulean settled on violet and she fingered the smooth leather. "Your turn."

Emotions swarmed the blonde officer as she quaked under the slightest grazing of Rose's fingertips across her stomach; every inch of her being was screaming at her to pull out now, to not ruin the beauty of the friendship which had so marked their journey to this horrid land of ashen desolation, to hide from nearly a decade of not having been touched. She wasn't ready for this, but she sure as Hell didn't want to stop it and risk hurting the Da Silva woman; a nervous exhalation of breath accompanied the creaking of leather pants sliding down scarred legs, and Cybil Bennett came to understand that while she was embarrassed, Rose Da Silva was absolutely terrified.

"You've never done this before, have you Rose?"

The mother stilled.

"Not…with a woman."

"Neither have I."

"You don't act like it."

"It's my job to feign confidence Rose."

"Well you've done a pretty damn good job of it."

"I haven't…been…with anyone in years."

"Cybil?"

"Yeah?"

"You're really not helping."

One gloved hand seemed to have a psychic understand of precisely where to find home in the moments following their brief conversational interlude; within seconds the woman pinned to the surface of the ancient couch gasped and writhed. What shocked the blonde haired officer most was that her friend's fear was becoming steadily more intense, or so it would seem; trembling from head to foot and apparently unable to calm herself, the seas unleashed tiny trickling tears which paraded down the sides of Rose's face and onto the cushions. A rhythmic pressure began to radiate from the core at which Cybil's hand was located, and the free hand carefully wiped into nonexistence the sweat and tear-plastered strands of hair which had dared to cross into the mother's eyes; at last a turning of the head resulted in the forging together of two pairs of eyes, violet to blue, blue to violet, sea to the evening sky above it; the cop placed a soft caress onto the pained mother's collarbone and then onto her lips once more, relishing in the flavor of sweet Rose as the first of many consummations arose.

From a distance, a shadow watched two of its own blacknesses sin behind the protection of the curtains.


	22. Author's Note

**Author's Note:**

I apologize for the length between updates. I am currently in the process of writing a new chapter, which will also be the final chapter. I shall expect to have it up very soon, if not later today. Just wanted to let you all know that this work hasn't been abandoned.


End file.
